


The Will of the Black Flame

by Taylor_Raiyne



Category: Naruto
Genre: Budding Relationship, Cannon, F/M, Humor, Hurt/Comfort, Journey, Loss of Virginity, Marriage, Post-War, Romance, Sasuke's POV, Smut, birth of Sarada, cannon time line, explanation of time gap, lot's of sex tags, yay they're cannon
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-08-08
Updated: 2016-09-27
Packaged: 2018-08-07 10:55:14
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 20
Words: 74,163
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7712230
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Taylor_Raiyne/pseuds/Taylor_Raiyne
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>At the end of Sasuke Shinden, they leave us with Sasuke saying "I'm home, Sakura." But he doesn't stay… This is my take on how Sakura becomes Uchiha Sakura. From the point of view of Uchiha Sasuke. I'll try to keep it as cannon as I can so if you haven't finished the manga you might want to wait on reading this.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Homecoming Part One

'I'm two years into my journey now, yet I don't feel much closer to redemption. Why is that?' Sasuke thought to himself while resting under a tree to catch his breath. 'I feel lighter now, most of the darkness has faded. So why do I feel like there's something more I have to do? No, I need to do.' Sasuke let out a soft sigh and got up, ready to head north to continue his journey.

"Hm?" He sees a hawk circling above him and lifts his arm to let the animal land. After taking the scroll off of its leg he releases it with slight wag of his arm. He watches the bird gracefully fly out of view, and only then does he look to the scroll in his only hand.

_Hey you Bastard. Hope your journey is going well, we're all good here. Hinata and I got married, and I really wish you were here for it, everyone missed you, especially Sakura. The other day she compared what you're doing now, watching over the village from the shadows to being in Konaha police force like you wanted to when you were younger. Man, she looked proud, and sad. We all miss you buddy. We both know why you're doing this, but still man… She's waiting._

_Always your friend, Uzumaki Naruto._

Sasuke stared at the end of the letter for a long time. After several minutes his eyes started to sting and he realized he hadn't been blinking. 'What the hell is wrong with you?' he asked himself as he shook his head and jumped into a tree, heading north. He had only been traveling a few minutes when he stopped dead in his tracks.

_She's waiting._

Before he knew what his body was doing he had turned around and started heading south, towards the village of his birth, towards all of the bonds he spent most of his life running away from, towards his home.

After about a day of traveling he was finally at the gates to Konaha. It had changed so much, as had the people waiting inside for him. The same guards that had always manned the gate ushered him through once they recognized him. And that easily, that quickly he was here. 'But where do I go now?' he thought to himself. He saw the Hokage tower in the distance, started walking towards it, figuring his best bet was to see Kakashi first. He wasn't in a hurry so he took his time to get a feel for the changes in Konaha these last few years. The new shops and houses quaintly decorated, the new Jonin HQ, and the new updated hospital. He froze.

Once again his body was acting faster than his mind could process. He was used to this during fights, but there was no threat here. 'What am I doing just standing here?' Then he felt what his body already had. His eyes closed, savoring it. It felt like being under a waterfall on the first day of spring… He basked in it for a moment, not thinking of anything but the overwhelming peace he felt, like breathing fresh air for the first time in years.

He opened his eyes finally gathering his thoughts. Finally after a few more moments he realized what it was that he felt… It was chakra. And he had felt it before. 'Has it always been that… Peaceful?' He ran towards it, not noticing the Children's Mental Health Clinic sign, not noticing the receptionist shockingly yelling for him to slow down, not noticing the blond woman who gasped, yelling "Sasuke-kun!" He kept running until he was at the source.

There it was. There she was. Pink petals of hair tied up loosely in a pony tail, red sleeveless shirt hugging every curve of her body, a warm loving smile on her face, sparkling pools of emerald with nothing but kindness in them. Yes, there she was, Haruno Sakura bent over soothing a crying child.

She hadn't noticed him yet, so he studied her further, holding himself back, letting her comfort the child that clung to her legs. She had grown, even since he last saw her. She was 20 now, and every bit a woman… Her body had filled out nicely since he left. Her breasts, though still small were fuller now, threatening to show cleavage as she bent down. Her face had lost all the roundness of a child and was breathtaking. Her legs… 'No. Stop, what are you thinking?!' He scolded himself.

He hadn't realized she had noticed him now, for he was lost in thought. Her eyes met his and he snapped out of it. He thought her face conveyed love before, but now she smoldered with it all over her face. A tear was threatening to roll down her face.

And there they stood. Eyelocked but not speaking, not breathing. Just taking each other in, though he was sure his face didn't relay this.

"I'm home, Sakura."

Finally the tear fell and she smiled a smile that made his heart stop, made every part of his being freeze right there. He was suddenly just like that child, he needed her touch, he wanted to break down and sob right there in her arms while she smiled that beautiful smile at him. But still, he kept his face emotionless.

"Welcome home, Sasuke-kun!" She managed to squeak out. The child she had been comforting looked at the two of them wonderingly. He looked back up at her and pulled on the shorts, trying to gain back her attention. But she could only see Sasuke now, it was written on her face, all of the loving things she wanted to scream at him, but still neither of them spoke. Neither of them could breathe at all.

The silence was broken when the blond who had recognized him slipped into the room behind Sasuke. He noticed now it was Yamanaka Ino.

She coughed. "Yoki-chan, how about you and I see if there's any chocolate in the vending machine, hm?"

The child beamed, forgetting Sakura and ran out of the room with Ino smirking in tail.


	2. Homecoming, Part Two

It was Sakura who broke the silence, for Sasuke was afraid he wouldn't be able to control his voice. Inside he was breaking down, crumbling before. Why? He did not know. All he knew was that he needed her, more than he needed air, more than he had ever needed anything in his life. 'What is happening to me?'

"How long have you been back?" She said, blushing at the way he must have been staring at her.

He immediately looked away, studying a poster on her wall as if it held all of the secrets he needed to know. Only then could he speak without her knowing his thoughts.

"Hn, I got back just now, a couple of minutes ago."

He stole a glance of her and she was blushing, her eyes shocked. 'Shit I just told her she was the first person I came to see.'

"I noticed your chakra on the way to see Kakashi." Was what he said outloud.

'And it made me go slightly insane, so I **had** to see you before I burst at the seems.' Is what he thought.

Slight disappointment flashed on her face, but she was still blushing, still staring into him. Staring into his very sole.

He let out the breath he didn't know he was holding.

"I better go see him now, just wanted to let you know that I was back." He shakily whispered. His emotion was starting to sink into his voice. He had to get out of her sight before it overcame him. He quickly turned around, lifting his hand to say goodbye.

"I have a guest room!" She almost screamed.

He froze and slowly turned and looked her, letting his confusion onto his face to compel her to explain without actually having to speak.

"It's just. It'll take Kakashi-sensei a few days to get you an apartment, and Naruto just got married though he'd say yes you'd probably feel like you'd be intruding, and you shouldn't have to stay in a hotel in your own village. And I could cook you a home cooked meal, you probably haven't had one of those in a while, and…" Her voice faded, her face was as red as a tomato as she rambled on. 'An older version of me would probably think her annoying' He thought.

She grimaced, obviously thinking this too. But instead all he could think was 'Adorable…'

He realized he was waiting for her to speak. 'Should say no, I won't be able to control myself… But… From what?' He shook his thoughts away. But again he acted with out thinking. He slowly walked towards her, he could see her trying to swallow. 'Lovely…' He slowly raised his only arm and tapped her on the purple diamond seal on her forhead.

"I'll get the address from Kakashi." He said, something he didn't even recognize flowed into his voice. With a half smile creeping on his face, he turned and said "Gotta go."

He tried to walk out of the clinic as calmly as he could, trying not to run away, trying not to run back.

Once he got outside he decided to take the roof tops to the Hokage tower.

He was one roof top away now, and he stopped before anyone could see him. "Is it.. raining?" he whispered to himself. He looked up, the sky had a few puffy pieces of cotton, but nothing that would cause rain so he touched where he felt the water.

He was crying. Uchiha Sasuke, the avenger of the Uchiha clan, the rival and equal to the next Hokage. The man who showed no emotion, even to himself was crying. For the first time since he had killed Itcahi. But he was sad. He wasn't mad.

In fact he was eladed. He was happier than he could remember being since the last time his mother had smiled at him.

He smiled for the first time since he had last left Konaha. He was happy.

He collected himself and gracefully lept to the ground at the base of the tower, sighing.

He was about to open the door when Naruto accidentally hit him with it.

"Oh sorry, man… S-s-sasuke! You bastard when did you get back!?" He busted out a huge grin the covered his entire face. Behind him was the weary looking white-haired Hokage.

"I just arrived, loser."

"Oh! Wait hey…!" Naruto faked a glare at his best friend, still smiling.

"Sakura will be happy to hear—" the Hokage interjected, a small smile reaching his old, tired eyes.

"I just saw her." Sasuke interrupted him without thought.

His old teacher and best friend both raised their eyebrows and shared a suspicious look with each other.

'Shit, what is _happening_ to me!'

"Anyway Sasuke, I know you're here to report to me, but Naruto and I have an important meeting with the Feudal Lord to get to. We can speak when I get back next week. Do you have somewhere you can stay until I return?" Kakashi informed him pleasantly enough.

"I was supposed to ask you where Sakura lives. She said she had a spare bedroom I could use." Sasuke said sighing.

'Here it comes' he begrudgingly thought.

Both the Hokage and his protégé's mouths dropped at this, to which Sasuke rolled his eyes, obviously getting annoyed.

"Yeah sure, it's 4 houses down on the opposite side of the street from her parents. A one story blue western style house. Oh wait—do you even remember where her parents live?"

To this Sasuke nodded, trying to keep his face neutral.

"Okay great then you shouldn't miss it!" Naruto smiled another huge grin.

"We've got to get going, Naruto." Kakashi said, ever so patiently.

"Oh right, well see you when we get back! You better still be here, ya Bastard!" Naruto laughed clamping his prosthetic hand down on Sasuke's shoulder.

"I'll be here. See you." He said, eyes closed and sighing.

He watched them walk away until he couldn't see them anymore. 'I wonder if she's already home…' He pondered, figuring she freaked out and rushed home the second he left, he figured he shouldn't keep her waiting any longer and headed towards her house. 'Time to go home..' He thought, before being stopped again by his thougghts. 'To **her** home.' He corrected himself with a shake of his head before continuing.

The house he came to was a quaint one, much smaller than he had though, but with certain charm to it. As he got closer, he felt it again. That warm, wonderful feeling of her chakra surrounded him again. Karin had always bothered him by saying his chakra was just so delicious she couldn't help but be near him… Is this what she had meant? If so, her clinginess made a little more sense now. He wanted to be wrapped up in everything that was Sakura and he wasn't even in her presence yet.

Sighing off his feelings, he walked up to the door and was about to knock on the dark blue door when Sakura flung it open, smiling wider than Naruto had, and once again as red as a tomato. 'Beautiful' is all he could say in his head.

"Sasuke-kun! You're here already!" She blurted out before moving aside for him to enter.

"Hn, Kakashi and Naruto had to go meet the Feudal lord so I didn't get to report in." Is all he said without evening looking at her as he stepped in.

His first impression of the inside was surprise. It was a beautifully decorated little house. He noticed on the other end of the room he had walked into was were two lone photos. One was the picture of them as genin all those years ago in team 7. The other was one of her with parents, it looked like one from when she became a chunin.

Sakura closed the door behind as he took off his shoes gracefully. He took off his tattered tan travelling cloak, and handed to her.

"You must be tired, do you want me to show you to your room?" She asked still blushing.

"I think I rather shower first." He said as steadily as he could, still not looking at her.

"Oh—yeah of course." She stuttered and motioned for her to follow him.

She stopped at the bathroom door. Not realizing how close it would be, and still examining the house, he almost ran into her. Instead he stopped so close to back his chin was touching her hair. They both unknowingly shivered at the contact. She smelled like roses and cherries and something that was so just.. Sakura it made his heart thaw slightly.

She didn't turn around. They were both frozen again.

Into her hair he breathed "Sakura thank you." With so much adore in his voice even he was taken aback by it.

She slowly turned to look at him, shocked and questioning eyes met his.

"I'm home, Sakura." Was all he said as he slipped around her, his hand just barely brushing her waist. She was still standing there frozen and shocked and so obviously in love when he shut the bathroom door, a smile on his face again.


	3. The Fire in Him

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> First crack at a lemon, let me know what you think!

Later that night as he laid in the simple guest bedroom of his former teammate he found himself smiling again. He could hear her soft snoring in the room next door, he could feel the soft pull of her resting chakra, keeping him more at peace than he'd ever thought possible, so at peace he drifted into a deeper sleep than he'd had in years.

_The village was emblazoned with black flames, lowly lighting the scene around him. The air smelt so metallic you couldn't even tell things were burning just feet away. He moved his hand to look at it, it was sticky, covered in dark blood. His entire body was drenched in it. Confused, he quickly checked himself for injuries, finding none._

_"Sasuke-ku…" A familiar voice cried at his feet, a whole in her chest, emerald unseeing eyes looking around frantically._

With a thunderclap he snapped awake, gasping and crying. He'd had this dream before, and it had always affected him. But this time he was hyperventilating, he couldn't find his breath, all he could do was cry like a small child.

When he looked up he saw her standing in his doorway, looking at him with loving worried eyes. 'Get yourself together man, this isn't you. You don't do this dammit!' He tried to calm himself, tried to put a neutral expression on his face but all he could do was cry. All he could do was need her there, soothing him. All he could do is be selfish. He lifted his hand up to her, still crying.

She walked towards him slowly, there was fear in her eyes. This made him cry even harder until finally she was sitting next to him, whole body facing him and she was in his arm.

"Shhhh… It's okay Sasuke-kun, please calm down and tell me what happened." She spoke like she had to that little girl earlier.

'This is not right, I don't want you to be my mother, I want you to be…' But what did he want her to be?

She pulled her face away to look at him with shocked eyes, blushing again. His own eyes conveyed some shock as well when he realized he had said his thoughts out loud.

"Sasuke-kun, what's wrong!?" She whispered in a panic when his lips started turning blue from hyperventilating.

'What do I do!? I can't move. She shouldn't see this, she shouldn't comfort me after all I've done to her!'

"I'm-I'm-I'm so SORRY!" He shouted the last part.

Before she could respond, before he could think, his lips were on hers. Still sobbing, he deepened the kiss, snaking his arm around her slender waist. She was surprised at this but didn't pull away. He pulled away, afraid to look at her he moved his lips to her neck instead, kissing up and down her pulseline "I'm sorry" he whispered into her neck. A small moan escaped her lips, at this he lost all control of his body. 'This is wrong.' He kept telling himself. But before he could pull away, he had moved so she was pinned to the bed, his only hand restraining her wrists. He looked into her eyes, expecting to see fear, but all he saw was lust, and love and all the comfort he needed in his life, so he kissed her again. But this kiss was different. Their tongues danced around each other in a way that aroused him. He pulled away to look at her again, 'You've calmed down, you got what you wanted, so let her go.' A voice told him in his head, but what she was wearing silenced that voice right quick.

She was blushing under his gaze, he looked down and saw a black nearly see through nightie, it went halfway down her exquisite thighs, and barely covered her small perfect breasts. All of his calm vanished, and suddenly it was like his body was on fire. It wasn't that he wanted her (though he did), he needed her or his whole body would go up in flames. He bent back down, kissing her deeply while shifting his body so he was in between her thighs. She said nothing, only panted and moaned. He released her wrists and she began frantically stroking his body, pulling him closer with the same need in her eyes that he had in is.

He moved his hand to one of those lovely breasts, thumbing lightly at her erect nipple, which awarded him a light moan. The sound drove him crazy, so crazy he had to hear it again. He pulled away from her kiss and smirked as she tried to catch her breath, he moved her nightie aside so he could attach his mouth to her other nipple, still playing with the other one, as he swirled his tongue around it she let out another moan that shot electricity up his spine. He sat up and gave her a dubious look that made her blush even deeper. Oh he was going to make her moan, he was going to make her scream.

He scooted back so his face could reach between her thighs. Embarrassed she, closed her legs, and looked at him in wonder.

"Open them Sakura." He demanded with a velvet voice that he knew turned her into butter. Once she complied, he ripped off her panties, not even looking at them. He continued to look into her eyes, watching her gulp and bite her lip in anticipation. He moved his head down and slowly moved his tongue around her already wet and swollen clit, earning a slight squeal. He slowly moved one finger inside of center, she squealed again.

He sucked at her until she was screaming and he could feel on his finger she was so close. He sat back up and swiftly removed his pants and boxers, already shirtless. He was harder than he ever thought possible, her eyes widened when she saw him, and she looked up into his eyes with a slight twinge of fear that made him freeze. She was still a virgin, he finally realized.

"Don't stop, Sasuke-kun… Just be gentle. But please, please don't sto—" She was interrupted by him slamming his hips into her, he didn't move as she adjusted, a tear rolling down her face. He kissed it away, still not moving inside of her and distracted her with a deep kiss, he could feel a little bit of blood pooling at his knees. She looked up him in between kisses and gave him a slight nod to continue. He moved as slowly as his body would let him, his mouth never leaving hers, until she started moaning softly into his mouth and her body finally relaxed. He started making true love to her then, going deeper and deeper, kissing every inch of her skin he could find. She was panting now every once in a while she would whisper his name and this only made him pump harder, until he was thrusting as fast as he could, and she was screaming in pleasure, her nails digging into his back, her legs wrapped around his waist. Finally she clamped down on him and let out one final scream as the weight of her orgasm hit her.

"I love you." She whispered, as she bit his neck, ushering in his own orgasm.

He was done now, but still inside of her as he whispered into her ear.

"I love you too."

At this before either of them could fully comprehend what this confession meant, she rolled him onto his back and started all over again.

They made love that night until the sun had been up a few hours. The only words shared between them were names and I love yous and moans. Even when they got tired, they couldn't stop. There was a need they both had held in for years, and now all of that held back love and lust was pouring out, and they didn't think they would ever be able to leave the bed, leave each other's arms.


	4. Memories

It was about 2 in the afternoon when Sasuke finally woke up. He reveled at the dream he had last night, he scoffed at himself for having such an inappropriate dream. Something definitely was wrong with him. 'Maybe I sould go get a check up or something?' he thought as he slowly opened his eyes and rolled over off of his back.

Once his eyes adjusted to sunlight, he froze. On the other pillow was a note that smelled of roses and cherries, and as he slowly looked further down he saw it.

It hadn't been a dream at all. Right there, right in front of him, almost screaming at him, was a small blood stain and a pair of torn pink panties.

Suddenly memories came crashing into him. The taste of her mouth, the skin of her neck, her sweet core. Ther feeling of her finger nails digging into his back as she whispered his name. How she felt when he was inside of her.

And then another terrifying revelation crashed over him: He had told her that he loved her. And he didn't. 'Do I?'

He fucked up. He had fucked everything up and she would probably be back soon thinking he loved her and she'd look so happy and he would die. All of his redemption wouldn't matter if he was faced with this ultimate crime he had committed.

He closed his eyes, trying to calm himself. 'Shit, shit, shit. What do I do!?'

He looked over to the note on the pillow and slowly picked it up, trying not to smell the paper.

Sasuke-kun,

I had to sneak out to go check on my clinic, I'll be back soon.

I love you.

'No.' He had gotten dressed quickly before, spending most of his youth on the run, but he had to admit this was a record. In the matter of maybe two minutes he had all of his belongings together and was about to bolt out of the small house of that damn pinkette who had managed to turn him into a blubbering hormonal teenager last night.

He had committed an atrocity. He had spent most of his life committing atrocities. He was shit again, and the last two years of helping people and changing was null and void now. He had taken a precious thing from her and worse than that, he had lied to her, as far as he could tell at least.

'A note. You're destroying her again. At least tell her why.'

He walked out of the room to the small living room, and quickly spotted the same notepad and pen she had written the note for him with. He closed his eyes, full in his resolve and sat on the couch dictating in his head how to soften this blow.

When he finally opened them his breath hitched and his eyes flew so wide it slightly hurt his face.

You better not run,

yet.

'She knew. Of course she knew.' A small smirk broke on his face. He looked around finally and saw that there was a small backpack filled to the brim sitting on the floor next to him on the couch which was covered in a tarp. In fact, everything was covered in tarps. She knew exactly what would happen again, and this time he knew she wouldn't ask to follow him, she just would.

'She's changed. Grown.' He smiled at this. Perhaps he could love this Sakura who knew him so well she had foreseen his actions exactly, he wouldn't put it past her to have planted her panties, that he was sure he had thown on the floor, on the bed for him to find. She knew him better than he knew himself, better than anyone ever would.

And suddenly he couldn't run anymore, he couldn't even move. He would wait like a puppy for her to return. He could let her come with him this time, he could do that much for her.

He realized in the silence of her absence this is what he had been waiting for. Even the first time he had left the village, even at 13, he had wanted her to come with him. He always wondered why he contemplated her offer, now he knew.

Long overlooked memories flooded back to him:

Her as an annoying fan girl he hated but tolerated out of obligation.

Her crying over him at Naruto bridge, him wondering why he'd only said "Sakura I can't breath." Instead of telling her to not touch him like he would have any other.

Seeing her beaten and bloodied with her long pink hair sloppily cut, standing in front of him. Protecting him.

The most powerful rage he had ever felt, even more powerful than towards Itachi, when he saw the bastards who had dared to hurt her.

Him leaning back into her embrace when she had stopped him from killing them.

Him standing so close behind her, he could smell her hair when he had thanked her.

Brushing the tears from her unconscious form when he had gently placed her on that bench.

Seeing her for the first time in 3 years, and only being able to say her name, after his pale replacement had gone on about how much they loved him.

Trying to kill her, in the depth of his psychosis, and silently letting a single tear slip out that night, so thankful that Kakashi had stopped him.

Balling like a little baby when he had Itachi's eyes. The what ifs kill him. Wondering what if he had known why Itachi had done it. What if he had stayed, what if what if what if.

Seeing her power and being confused by how proud he felt when her seal appeared on the forehead she hated. How amazing she was when he realized she had finally caught up to him and the loser, if not surpassed them.

Crying and apologizing when he lost his arm.

And finally, tapping her seal like Itachi had all those years ago. And thanking her again, before abandoning her.

He finally realized in one soul crushing moment two things:

1: Their story, his story, was not one of simple blinding rage and hatred that eventually led to redemption. But one of love trying to break through that hate.

2: He had ignored his entire life one such simple truth it was half idiotic he hadn't noticed before. He was in love with Haruno Sakura. And had been for years, perhaps since the bridge, perhaps since she had embraced him and stopped him from killing, perhaps since he had thanked her and left her the first time.

He loved her. The man with no emotions but hatred and anger had found his soul mate when all he could see was hate.

He didn't think he'd ever be able to tell her. But he knew she wouldn't hold it against him. Perhaps she already knew.

His redemption journey was far from over, and now he knew why: He had to redeem himself to her now. He had to make it up to her, for all the pain he had caused her. This was his mission now, and one he would accept silently, stoically, and never tell anyone about.


	5. Decisions

It was dark now, if he had to guess it was about 9 o'clock, and he was still sitting on her couch as if a statue deep in contemplation. He hadn't moved since he sat down, and though his body ached he couldn't bring himself out of his head enough to move. His senses were more dulled than they had ever been. He was weak in these new reveltations. So there he sat, waiting on the girl he had abused. The girl he loved.

He was so drunk on shock he didn't hear her come in, until a meak sob came from the alcove where coats and shoes lived.

'Shit the lights are off, it looks like I'm not here.'

Sakura continued to sob quietly, the sound breaking his heart into a million peices. 'This looks weird, shit what do I...' Thinking quickly he leaned back to look asleep, expecting her to turn on the light and beam at him when she realized she was mistaken.

Instead, she walked around the corner into her pitch black living room and plopped on the couch, still sobbing and effectively slamming into his lap.

"Eeeeeek!" She shrieked and before he could react she landed a punch on his jaw so powerful the couch slammed backwards, causing him to hit his head as well.

"What the hell Sakura..." He muttered in an emotionless voice to the dark, a comical smile on his face. He knew she couldn't see him, even he had trouble seeing in this darkness, but he could make out her exquisite form against the black.

"S-sasuke-kun?" it just a whisper, as if she thought she were talking to ghost.

"Are you going to turn on the light? I think I'm bleeding, Sa-ku-ra." He said in a feeble attempt at teasing her.

"Aa-Yes!" He went about trying to return his emotionless masked he used for dealing with every person he met. He burrowed his brows, finding it was harder to hide himself with her now.

Sakura darted over to the wall and he was assaulted with light. His eyes hurt, partially from adjusting to light after sitting there in the dark for so many hours, and partially from hitting his head.

She looked at him in horror and embarrassment and it reminded him of how small children look when they know they're about to get a spanking from their parents. 'Hm, maybe I should try that.' A genuine chuckle escaped his lips at the joke in his head and the overwhelmingly comical scene that had just unfolded.

Uchiha Sasuke did not find many things funny, nor did laugh or even smile but maybe once a year, but this was funnier than anything to him.

Sakura stood there in awe now, hearing him laugh in amusement for the first time. She starting laughing with him and fell to the floor, only making him laugh more.

They stayed like this for a few more moments until they naturally faded to just smiles. Hers big and bright and loving, his just a smirk.

"Welcome home, Sakura." He finally said, which granted him a full smile showing her white perfect teeth.

"I'm home" She breathed, and crawled over to where he was sitting on the floor behind her tipped over couch.

She poked the back of his head and he winced from the sharp pain, which quickly subsided as her warm spring chakra flooded into him. He closed his eyes, reveling in the comfort.

After a few moments, he slit his eyes open and peeked up at her. She still blushed being this close to him, even after last night, he noticed with some pride.

"I fell asleep on the couch waiting for you." He lied, breaking the silence for her.

"O-oh, sorry I took so long, I had some thing to finish up at the clinic." She barely stammered out, as red as a tomato now.

"Finish up?" He knew what she meant, he knew they'd be leaving together now, but he was curious as to her plan to convince him. It was too amusing an opportunity to let slip by, by letting her know he had already decided. Besides, he wasn't ready for her to know what he'd realized today, he couldn't let her know what she was to him yet.

So he would make her work for it a little bit, she'd beg and he'd eventually be the veritable hero by finally saying yes. He'd earn her awe-strucken thanks for changing his mind.

"I'm coming with you." She said finally, with less emotion than he usually showed. She finished with his head, and moved on to healing the bruise forming on his cheek. He just looked at her, waiting for her reasons and gooey expressions. That's what always happened.

But she didn't speak, instead she hummed softly as she healed him, as if the conversation was over.

He raised an eyebrow at her matter-of-fact behavior. "Sakura?"

"It's not up for discussion. I put this plan in place months ago, Sasuke-kun. You're not the only one bringing in intel on a possible Otsutsuki threat in the future. So I decided to help you on your journey, when you returned." She said steadily, calmly, with a flat look on her face as she stared into his eyes.

"You decided?" 'How arrogant! Even if I want her to come now, she had no way of knowing that! She made all of these plans, and I could have left while she was gone and the-' He snapped out of his thoughts when he remembered how well staged her house had seemed earlier.

"So the second note, it was a test?" He glared at her now, but she remained as collected as could be.

"Yes, if you didn't even want to leave a note, then I'd move on. If you read the second note but left anyway, I'd move on too." She confirmed his thoughts.

"I know you won't talk to me about what goes on in your head or heart, my questions always get turned down, or ignored. So I promised myself to not ask anymore, but I still had to know how you felt, even just get a glimpse. And you told me everything I need to know. So I'm coming with you and I'm not asking, and you're not abandoning me, Uchiha." He winced at her words, but he understood none the less. She had gotten what she had needed from him without making him uncomfortable.

God, this woman knew him too well. 'She's grown up, for sure.' He smirked again as she silently got up to fix the couch, her ample ass inches from his face, stirring heat in his stomach, but he had to keep his head in the game.

Again, curiosity had the better of him. If she was going to be his equal, in his mind at least, she had to play head games as well as he did. He may not show it, and he may not talk or emote often, but he fancied himself a genius at reading people and predicting their moves, and emotions. It had always helped him in talking to people. He would play a game in his head, to get as much done in the conversation with the least amount of words. It was harder than you'd think, to convince someone of something while barely communicating. And he was good at it.

"And if I refuse?' He asked, in a slightly teasing tone.

She didn't look at him, but simply said, as if talking about the weather to a stranger: "You didn't. You're still here."

She had him at that.

"Annoying." He mocked her.

"Hard headed." She mocked back as she walked to the kitchen and tossed him a tomato.

And at that, Sasuke knew he would not regret taking her with him.


	6. Another Hit to the Face

Though she had gotten her whole apartment ready for their departure the night they agreed she'd go with him (to make a point) they decided to wait until Kakashi and Naruto returned. Sakura of course, was the one who made this decision, much to Sasuke's dismay.

They still had 3 days to go now, and she had just decided he couldn't hide in her house any longer.

"Ino invited us out for drinks tonight with everyone. I told her we'd go." Sakura told him in her new matter-of-fact attitude as she walked in the door.

She'd been gone all day at the clinic, and he missed her (not that she'd ever know that). Though they hadn't made love since that first night of blind passion, he was hopeful he could figure out to romance her into to doing it right this time.

He raised his eyebrow. "I refuse." He muttered simply and went to the kitchen to start dinner for her, like he had every night this week.

She giggled and followed him, he heard her footsteps behind him, but didn't turn around as he started slowly cutting the meat with his only hand. Things took him longer now, but he didn't let it bother him anymore. He might be slower at tasks like this, but not helpless like when it had first happened.

She stopped right behind him, so close the tips of her breasts lightly graced his back. He involuntarily shivered at this, cursing himself for showing her what she did to him.

A small, slender pair of arms snaked themselves around his waist and she burried her face in his back, pressing her body to him. It reminded him of when she had embraced him in the forrest of death all of those years ago. Again, he leaned back into her silently and sighed. 'Maybe I could go, as long as I just talk to her...?'

But Sakura had other plans it seemed. One of her small hands inched down to his beltline and inched inside both his pants and boxers. Sasuke was shocked at her crass, she really was getting brave with him, perhaps too much. He quickly turned around and pushed her up against another counter. Her face was almost the color of tomatoes, and it made him smile that her nervousness about what they were now mirrored his own.

He had a slight feeling she was testing him again, though he didn't mind. He liked when she would use actions other than gooey fangirl expressions to show how she felt now. And he found himself doing things to respond. She had whispered "I love you" every once in a while. Sometimes it seemed like she said it to herself, not wanting him to hear. And he found himself replying by poking her seal and resting his forehead on hers, just as Itcahi had the last time someone told him they loved him. He couldn't respond then either, he could only lean in and hope Itachi knew what that meant. Itachi had, of course, taken that as "I love you, too." and so now, did Sakura.

He bore his eyes into her soul, checking for any flicker of fear at him pinning her against the counter, touching her. But all he saw was lust and love and growing impatience as he assaulted her with his eyes. When he was satisfied that she wanted him to continue, he smiled a genuine smile at her, which felt weird on his face and slightly forced. He probably looked odd but at least he tried, and he earned her to gape slightly.

He bent down to kiss the seal on the forehead she hated, smiling into her forehead before moving down to her left eye. He placed small affectionate kisses all over the face he adored, she could only gape at him, blushing and shy with an excited, innocent smile threatening to break onto her face. She looked at him the same way she had the first time he tapped her seal, which caused his heart to melt.

Her hands, which had been clasped tightly on her chest, reached out to his vest, getting on her tip-toes to stretch up and kiss him, meeting him in the eye.

He sucked at her bottom lip, slowly moving his hand down her back, he felt her shiver and melt into his chest. They kept eye contact while kissing slowly, deeply, and he could tell by the look she was giving him that he could have her right then and there, but she had given him enough already.

Sasuke only came back to check on her, and to check in with the Hokage and his protege, but the idea of seeing the rookie nine (though it would be exhausting) kind of sounded... Nice?

He had spent so much time by himself the last two years, the thought of some (what one could call normal) social interactions would do him good. And seeing Sakura's happiness and knowing he was the cause of it could make him do anything now.

Abruptly he dropped his only arm from her back and took a step back, re-applying the indifferent mask he used for social interaction. "Fine, I'll go. But I'm not getting dressed up." He conceded with a bored tone.

"Wha-? Yaaaaaaaay!" Sakura's smile nearly broke her face and she clapped her hands together that was so much a Sakura thing it could have been her genin self standing in front of him.

He rolled his eyes at her antics, but smiled to himself when he turned away. Yes, tonight would be a good night indeed if she smiled like that.

He heard Ino and some other voices arrive about 30 minutes later while Sasuke was bathing. Even over the too high water pressure of Sakura's showerhead he could hear the two woman bickering and laughing over what dresses to wear. He found himself smiling as he pondered the contradiction that was Sakura Haruno. She was indeed the strongest and most skilled kunoichi in the world now that she'd surpassed Tsunade, but she could still shriek like a little girl when discussing which dress brought out her eyes the best.

Sasuke turned the water off once he heard nothing. Drying himself off, he could barely make out broken whispers. He thought he heard his name, but he let it slide, tonight would be a good night, and then he'd be off with Sakura and none of this would matter anyway.

He dressed in a plain black long sleeve shirt, and a pair of grey pants. He no longer took to adding the Uchiha crest to his back. Most people didn't know what it meant in his travels and those who did were immediately terrified of him. He had a hard enough time getting people to trust him with this damn purple eye.

He gave himself a once over in the mirror, adjusting his now overgrown bangs to one side to cover his Rinnegan, and slowly left the bathroom.

The sight he was assaulted with was definitely one he never thought he'd see. There, in Sakura's small living room were 4 very much half naked women, all gaping at him. He froze on the spot, like dear in headlights, and tried his hardest to only keep his eyes on the pink haired one. But before he could even blink there was a coffee table in the air aiming straight for his face.

In his shock, he could think to dodge it, and so for the second time that week Sakura Haruno had broken his nose.

"Ah FUCK!" He squeezed his eyes closed and tried to stop the bleeding of his nose as Sakura came to her sense (the other girls had hidden in the kitchen) and ushered him to her small bedroom.

"Sorry Sasuke-kun! You were only in there for less than 10 minutes, and we thought we'd be done changing already!"

Immediately after sitting on the bed, a soothing chakra entered his nose, healing it yet again.

"Well it was good to see everyone again." He tried.

The chakra stopped suddenly and he peaked over at Sakura, who was looking at him like he three heads.

"D-Did you just make a joke?" She stammered out.

"Hn, guess so. Maybe you should check my head too." Now she looked like he had four heads, and just before he was annoyed by her staring she burst out laughing. It sounded like bells, and made him follow suit, much quieter of course.

Sakura finished with his nose and bade him to stay in the bedroom until she was sure it was safe.

"Okay, Sasuke-kuuuun!" he heard from the living room.

As he apprehensively walked out, he finally got a look at whose half naked forms he'd been assaulted with earlier. Hyuga (well Uzumaki now, he corrected himself) Hinata wore a modest lavender dress with no sleeves that came down to her knees. Ino wore the shortest blue skirt he'd ever seen with what could be called a bra with fishnet on top. And the other girl (He couldn't place her name) from the Sand wore a simple short black number, and he took note of the Nara clan's emblem on her right sleeve. But what caught him dead was Sakura. She wore a short red dress that clung to her frame like a second skin. It went all the way up to her throat but had a tear shaped cut out that revealed an not so modest amount of cleavage. He couldn't scrape his gaze off of her.

"Oi, Uchiha, quit gawking! We're late." He recognized it as Ino's voice, but he couldn't be bothered to respond.

Sakura was blushing now, and looking down shyly. He contemplated forgoing the evening's plans and immediately begin ravishing her right then and there but stopped himself. He said he'd go, and Sakura should say goodbye to her friends.

The filed out of the small house and started walking down the road to whatever bar they were headed to. Sakura remained quiet with a smile still breaking on her face and held on to his empty sleeve with two fingers the whole way.

Yes, he thought, tonight would be a good night.


	7. Bar FIghts and a Bench

About an hour into drinking, and everyone including the last Uchiha was becoming slightly pink cheeked and more open. Around the large booth, he took in all of their faces, remembering them as they were as children and seeing how they are now.

Choji sat eating beer nuts like they were going out of style, complaining that they picked a bar with no real food. An image flashed in his mind of a young boy with an ever present bag of potato chips.

Shikamaru looked bored as ever but openly smiled now at the woman next him, Temari as he remembered now. He remembered fighting her when they were genin and couldn't believe the bored genius and the bitchy fan girl were now a happily married couple whispering and giggling to each other.

Sai, his replacement, made his awkward jokes, and called him traitor when he spoke to him. A former version of himself would mind but as of late, the truth didn't bother him. He was a traitor, and if he forgot that fact he might slip back into old habits and he couldn't allow that.

Next to Sai, cuddled into his side in fact, was Ino. She was looking at his pale replacement much how she used to look at him. Only instead of blatant admiration he noticed it was love in her eyes. Good for them, he found himself thinking.

Hinata was by her self at the end across from Choji happily chatting with Sakura. She still seemed her timid self, but her openness was a far cry from the girl who pushed her fingers together and stuttered over everything she said. The dobe must have been good for her.

Finally his eyes grazed down to the pinkett at his side, her cheeks were more flushed than anyones, as she was winning the drinking competition with Ino. She laughed loudly at most everything being said and subtly left her hand on his thigh under the table.

Sasuke remained silent for the most part, drinking his shocho slowly. He wasn't much of a drinker so this third glass brought a nice buzz to everything and he found himself smiling and nodding with more fervor when the others talked to him. On Sakura's fifth bottle of sake and Ino's fourth, the girls declared everyone should dance and ushered everyone out of the booths. Sasuke gave his decline, tapping Sakura on the forehead and watched as everyone but Hinata and Choji followed. He was most surprised that Shikamaru agreed, but figured marriage must change you, and couldn't find it in himself to cringe at that.

"When is Karui-san going to be on her way. Choji-kun?" Hinata asked once the three of them were alone.

Who's that? Sasuke wondered, pouring himself some sake from Sakura's sixth bottle.

Choji gave him a look he didn't understand and said somewhat too strained for how drunk he was, "I don't know if she'll be coming tonight." Then more happily, "If she does I hope she brings food!"

To this Hinata laughed slightly and waved her hand at Choji's antics before giving Sasuke a pointed look he couldn't understand. He was missing something here, but he was just drunk enough not to care. He looked over at Sakura attempting to dance with Ino and Sai in a weird three person couple's dance and suddenly got the urge to go to her.

Without saying anything he got up, ignoring the fluidity of his limbs and made his way over to her. He came up behind her and coughed to let her know he was there as to not get punched again. He slithered his arm around the front of her waist, pressing the back of her body firmly against his and rested his chin on her head. The stayed like this, slowly swaying side to side as she talked happily with the dancing pale couple in front of her. They weren't swaying to the music but neither of them cared.

Just as he was starting to enjoy himself, he found a form on his back and the cold steel pressed into his neck.

"How dare you show your face around here, you Uchiha DOG!" A woman's voice yelled behind him.

"Karui!" Everyone seemed to shout in unison. The civilian patrons immediately backed to the corner of the rooms while the shinobi looked on with amusement. His friends (he realized now that's what they were) all looked on shocked and horrified. Sakura swiftly spun around out of his arm and placed a too strong grip on the brown hand at his throat.

The woman, Karui, shrieked at this but didn't move.

Choji came to stand at his side pleading with the woman. "Please, honey. Just let it go. Everyone's having a good time, let's not ruin it, okay?" The woman seemed to agree because she lowered her now swollen wrist from his throat and he immediately turned to square her up, his fight instincts taking over.

He reached where his katana should be and silently cursed himself for not bringing it. "Do I know you?" He spat at the redhead. He recognized her coloring as a hidden cloud shinobi.

"I'm a student of Killer Bee, you dog." She spat back.

"So? Why should I care?" He taunted, and it worked because in the next moment both of their bodies were constrained by wobbly, drunk shinobi.

"Choji, take Karui and leave." It's Shikamaru's voice at his back, his arms wrapped around his chest.

With a curt nod, Choji all but drags the fuming woman from the bar and everyone seems to relax. The all let go of him, well everyone but Sakura, who's still gripping his half arm too tightly. He looks down at her, but can't see her face.

Great, she must be mad at me. Fuck why did I do that!? He screams in his head. Sakura says nothing but nods to Ino and pulls him out of the bar too.

The cool crisp air feels wonderful on his too hot, drunk skin, but he can't revel in it. He has to fix what he's done. Again.

Sakura keep looking down as she pulls him along the road he doesn't recognize but guesses leads back to her house. The usually comfortable silence is killing him.

"I'm sorry," He finally says with a sigh.

She finally looks up at him, a tear rolling down her pink, sweaty face. "It's not your fault." She whispers but there's no conviction to it. They both know, this like many things are in fact his fault. He attacked that woman's master, and now she's gone and ruined Sakura's goodbye party. He's ruined yet another thing he can never fix, and this makes him want to sprint away from her, from this village, so he never again has to see the outcomes of his actions.

But, being the man he must become, he staying where he is, carefully supporting Sakura's too drunk weight along the road. She stops suddenly and lets go of his arm. He turns to look at her and what he sees, he's seen many times. She's crying silently, head bowed, hands clasped at her chest, feet pointed inward, knees about to buckle. She's moments away from collapsing in on herself and he has to stop it, but he can't figure out why this is happening.

Sure, the bar incident upset her, but it was even that bad. She could just be drunk crying, but even when they were genin and she cried too often, she always had a reason. "Sakura..." He softly calls for her, starting to close the gap between them.

When she looks up, he stops dead in his tracks. Her eyes meet his, and for a moment he sees nothing but absolute rage and hatred in those emerald orbs. It hits him like a brick. He's seen many things in those eyes over the years, love, worry, anger, fear, hurt. But never, towards anyone, even in battle has he seen Sakura Haruno's eyes filled with hatred.

In less than a moment she composes herself and the hatred is completely gone, and love and worry fill her eyes again. "Sakura," he tries again, trembling now from the hatred he knows she now harbors, "what is it?"

"Do you know where we are?" She whispers, still boring his eyes into his.

"The road back to-" But then he notices finally where she's led him and memories start crashing back. That wall, those trees, that stone bench behind her. It's where he first called her annoying, where she first confessed her love to him and he could only thank her and kiss away the tears from her unconscious form.

"I have nightmares too ya'know." She states, now turned away from him, eyes on the bench he wish didn't exist in this moment. "You'd think they'd be about you trying to kill me, or about me trying to kill you." Though tears are still falling her voice mirrors what his usually is, it's utterly void of all emotion. She could be talking about the weather.

Then, with unmistakable malice laced in she tells him, "But they're not. My nightmares are of you leaving, of you calling me annoying, thanking me for some god forsaken reason, and then leaving me on this fucking bench." He stay silent, letting her say what she needs to, trying to understand what this all means. "I'm a shinobi, nothing truly scares me. I've almost died countless times, I've taken lives, I've watched lives slip away when I should have saved them. But my one and only pathetic fear is of this bench. Of you leaving me behind, of me not mattering to you at all."

She turns to face him, the hatred back in her eyes. "I've forgiven your crimes, your attempts at my life and my village, I've forgiven what no one else seems to be able to without effort. They all think I'm a saint you know, for forgiving you those things." She takes a deep breath and closes her eyes. "But those things took no thought to forgive. Because though I'd never agree with your actions, I understand them. I understand why you felt you had to do them, Sasuke." He flinches slightly at the loss of his suffix. "But this," She motions to the bench behind her, "I can never understand this. You could have been cruel that night, you could have fought me, you could have said you hated me, you could have killed me. But instead you thanked me and knocked me out. Why, Sasuke? Since that day almost every night my mind tortures me with it, and I can never understand it. And now you're back and you said you loved me while you fucked me and you said I could come with you. But WHY!?" She's screaming now.

"Why did you do that back then?! Why are you doing this now!? What am I to you?! Just some girl you can let comfort you then throw away when she's not useful to you anymore? Why?" Her knees give out and she's sloppily, still drunk, sobbing on the ground.

Slowly, as to not startle her he walks up to her crying form and kneels down in front of her. Calmly, though inside he's breaking, he brings his first two finger to her forehead taps it. "I couldn't take you with me back then." He leaves his finger on her forehead and looks past her shocked tearstained face at the bench. "I knew I was going to live in the darkness and I couldn't taint you with it, Sakura. I couldn't say I hated you, because I never did. Even in the deepest pits of my darkness, even when I tried to kill you, I couldn't hate you. I tried." He closes his eyes now and lets his hand fall. "I tried so hard to hate you, even more than Naruto. He was my friend and my brother and I tried to escape that, but you..." He looks her in the eye. "You loved me."

"I thanked you for that. I thanked you for being the first person to love me since the massacre, and then I ran. Leaving you behind wasn't as selfless as that though." He gives a small smirk. "A part of me knew I loved you, even then, and I couldn't risk losing you, even to my own darkness. I needed the girl I loved to stay pure."

Her eyes are the widest he's ever seen them, tears are still spilling from them openly, but she's breathing calmly now at least. "And as to what you are to me? I don't know what to call it, but I do know this: You, Sakura Haruno, are everything to me. Even as a genin, do you remember? You were the only one who could touch me, the only one who could stop me from losing myself. The only one I said goodbye to. I don't know what you are to me compared to what your friends have with each other. But I do know, in those moments that I let myself think of a different future, even back then, all I saw was you."

He sighs now, expending all of his social energy in the most speaking he's done in years. When he looks at her she's still crying, but she's smiling too. "S-so you're not gonna leave me?"

"Not until you tell me to go." He says simply and gets up. "Let's go home." He helps her up, and they start walking back to her house in a comfortable silence.

Yes, he thinks, tonight was a good night.


	8. Team 7, Together Again!

"Sasuke-kun" He hears, his eyes still closed with sleepiness. A kiss on his jaw. "Sasuke-kun." A kiss on his pulse line. "Sasuke-kun." Teeth graze his nipple. "Time to get up." The voice is almost purring. He feels a kiss at his navel now. "Come on, Sasuke-kun." He can almost feel her pouting, but keeps his breathing steady and his face serene, eyes closed, curious what she'll do next. He feels a light kiss over his clothed and half awakened length. 'I could get used to waking up like this.' He thinks to himself, opening his one black eye to peak down at her.

He's assaulted with light from the too bright sun coming through her bedroom window. When he can focus he sees bright pink hair falling like a sheet over his crotch. "Hnn." Is all he responds with. Green eyes shoot up to meet him, smoldering with the same need that's growing in him.

Almost shyly, Sakura smiles at him and slowly pulls down his sleep pants. They both notice how goose bumps trail after her fingers and kisses. 'This woman is the death of me.' He sneers in his head. When she testingly grabs his length, and licks slow circles around the tip of it, he could almost cry it feels so good. Sasuke thought it felt good the first time he had her, but he could never guess the inside of her mouth could be this... amazing. He opens both eyes now, looking down at her pink head bobbing up and down, her green eyes locked on his, her pink cheeks.

He could let her do this all day and never tire of it, but he owes her more than he owes himself, and he made it his mission to make everything he can up to her, right? He reaches down to pull at her jaw with his only hand. Wordlessly, he leaves her mouth, a satisfying 'pop' comes from her lips and she crawls up on top of him with all the seduction of a cat going after her pray. He makes quick work of her green sweater and cups one of her perky breasts in his hand, thumbing over the rosy little nipple.

At this, she attacks his mouth, and their tongues begin the intricate battle over dominance. When she moans into his mouth, he feels his length twitch. He really wanted to wait to make her feel as amazing as she had just made him feel, but he needs her. And he needs her now.

He moves his hand, still kissing her mouth almost violently with her hands tugging at his air, to rip away the pink fabric separating them.

"TEEEEEMEEEEEEE, SAKURA-CHAAAAAAAN." The both freeze and look over towards the door. 'That god damn Dobe.' Sasuke grabs her face and pulls her back into their passionate kiss in hopes of just making the Dobe wait until he leaves, thinking they're not home.

Then they hear banging at the door. "I KNOW YOU GUYS ARE IN THERE COME ON, BASTARD OPEN UP!" Sasuke growls, and doesn't let Sakura out of his vice grip.

She finally breaks away, panting. "Something could be wrong..." She tries to tell him, but he won't have it at this point, he flips them over so she's pinned under his body.

"I don't care." Kiss. "The world," Kiss "could be" Nibble her bottom lip. "on fire right now." Suck at her pulse line. "and I wouldn't give a damn."

The look she gives him tells him that he's won. He simply moves her panties aside and enters with force and desperation.

Before the first moan can escape her lips they're met with: "OHMYFUCKINGGOD WHAT ARE YOU TWO DOING!? OH FUCK MY EYES MY EYES!" And the sight of retreating orange and black.

Flaccid now, and blood boiling, Sasuke pulls out of a very red Sakura and is off the bed with his pants pulled up in the next second. He stomps out to the living rooms, and finds Naruto gagging on the couch with his head in his hands.

"What the fuck, Dobe!?"

Without looking at him, Naruto nearly cries: "I was excited to see you guys, I even left the Lord's place early to see you! And I could feel your chakra inside and I thought you guys were still sleeping 'cause Shikamaru told me you all went drinking last night so I used me key to make sure you were okay. And my eyes," Naruto is nearly on the floor now. "my poor eyes."

Sasuke pinches the bridge of his nose, and hears Sakura stir in the bedroom. "Outside. Now, Dobe." He quickly makes his way to the rack and dons his cloak, slipping his shoes on with speed, and hears Naruto drag his feet behind him.

They walk in silence for a few moments down the stirring morning road.

"So... You and Sakura-chan, eh?" Naruto's voice stirs his just now found calm.

"It's none of your business, Dobe." Sasuke gives him his best glare and Naruto pulls him into an alley.

"Like hell it's not my business!" Naruto spits out at him.

"And how is that, hm? How is any of what you just saw your business?" Sasuke is really trying his hardest to not attack the next hokage at this point.

"Sakura-chan is like my sister, teme, and you've hurt her so much, now you're in there.. in there... well you know what you were doing!"

"She's a grown woman, and she can make her own decisions, idiot." 'What is he thinking?! Of course I know what I did to her! I don't yell at him for marrying the girl he ignored our whole fucking childhood!' Sasuke is on his way to losing his complete and utter shit at this point, he feels the Sharingan in his right eye swirling to life and he doesn't even try to stop it.

Naruto notices the bloodlust radiating off of his teammate now, and obviously is trying to calm down himself. "Well then, what was that? You said you were leaving again, last time I saw you." An idea flashes behind eyes and now he's grinning his foxish grin. "Are you staying, now?"

"No."

"What-" His smile drops and faster than normal people could see, Sasuke is holding a wrist with a kunai away from his throat and his back is up against a building. He sees red bleeding into his teammate's eyes. "You're just going to fuck the girl who's been in love with you for our entire lives and leave her again!? I thought you-What the fuck is wrong with you, teme!?"

Closing his eyes, and deactivating his Sharingan he simply replies: "She's coming with me, for your information."

To this Naruto immediately drop the weapon from his throat and openly gawks at this best friend. "Wait does that mean..."

"I'm going to tell you this once, and then you will drop it forever, dobe." Sasuke takes a deep breath. "I lo... Hn, I'm not going to hurt her again, okay?"

Naruto's eyes are wide now, taking in Sasuke's words. He nods, and Sasuke thinks he's finally off the hook. But this is Naruto Uzumaki he's dealing with. "What are your- your intentions then?"

Sighing now, "What do you mean, loser?" He openly whines. The topic is different than any conversation they've had before. But based on their tones, he thinks it's almost exactly how they've bickered since they were children. The idea almost makes him smile in the nostalgia, but when Naruto speaks, he immediately turns his face to an irritated scowl.

"Like, are you gonna marry her, are you just friends who, ya know, or are you just doing this because you think it's what she wants, teme? You can say you're not gonna hurt her, but unless what I just saw is leading somewhere permanent you're gonna destroy her worse than you ever have."

'Shit. I hadn't even thought of that, damn it. Damn it!' "I don't know. I don't know what I'm doing or why this is happening." He feels himself crashing over the edge now. Naruto has always been good at dragging out his inner thoughts. "I can't control myself around her now. I don't know what's happening to me." He sinks to the ground, and leans his head on the wall, looking up at the morning sky. "What is happening to me?" He whispers to it. He can't look at Naruto now.

"Tch, love does that ya'know." He feels Naruto's arm brush his half arm as he sits down to his left. "I guess it would be hard for someone like you to realize he's in love, huh?" When he says this there's no teasing or mocking in his voice.

"How did you realize it?" He demands of his blond friend.

Naruto starts chuckling in a way that shows how mature he's gotten. "It literally took me going to the moon and back for me to realize I loved Hinata-chan. Do you love her?"

"I think so but..."

"But everyone you love is dead?" Again there's no mocking or pity, just understanding in his voice.

"Aa."

"Well, she's not ya'know. And she's loved you since we started the academy, and she's going with you now." Naruto takes another steadying breath. "How'd she convince you of that, by the way?"

"She gave me a black eye then told me she was coming with me."

Naruto's laugh this time was every bit the laugh Sasuke grew up listening to. It brings almost as much warmth to his heart as Sakura's does. "Yeah that does sound like her."

"Hn, she's changed."

"We all have, even you."

"You think so?" Sasuke is softly smiling now, still looking at the sky.

"A couple years ago, I definitely wouldn't have walked in on THAT, and even if I had, half of Konaha would probably've been destroyed by now." He chuckles again, and even Sasuke snorts.

"Yeah, I guess that's true."

"But what changed exactly, teme? With Sakura-chan I mean."

Sasuke ponders this for a moment and finally looks at Naruto's face. "I don't know. I barely thought of her to be honest, but something snapped when I got your note and the moment I felt her chakra when I got here..." He looks away now, embarrassed to be this open, even with Naruto. But this is Naruto after all, and he's been his brother since before they were even born, so he says, "it was like she made me lose all grip to my sanity the second I saw her again."

"I know exactly what you mean, buddy." Naruto clamps a hand on his shoulder, causing him to look at him again.

"You do?"

"Yup, it was like one moment I barely saw Hinata-chan, and the next moment I couldn't see anything but her. It only took me a few months after that and she was my wife. It was just like Pervy Sage said back then..." His eyes glaze over with sadness for a moment before he smiles again. "Even the most powerful of men, actually especially the most powerful men, are absolutely powerless in front of the women they love." Naruto gives him a soft smile before getting up and dusting himself off.

Still pondering this, Sasuke does the same as they wordlessly walking back to Sakura's house.

"Oh, and teme?"

"Hn?"

"Nice ass." Naruto is giggling like a little school girl now, holding his hands up in defense in case Sasuke might try to attack him.

But Sasuke finds himself chuckling softly with a smirk on his face. "Shut up, dobe. I'll get you back for that one."

When they get back, Sakura is putting a simple breakfast on the table for all of them, smirking as if what happened before didn't bother her in the least. She chats happily with Naruto, and warns him time and time again to take care of himself while they're gone. They all find themselves laughing (even Sasuke) and reminiscing about their genin days. Sakura even tells a couple of embarrassing stories at Naruto's expense that took place while Sasuke was in his darkness. Their comfort and forgiving nature about all of his mistakes puts a smile on his face for the remainder of the morning and a warmth in his heart that he thinks he hasn't felt since he was a child.

After they've been done eating for a few hours, and they're still talking happily amongst themselves, they hear a knock at the door and all feel the familiar chakra of their sensei.

Sasuke decides to answer the door, and still smiles as he does so, hearing the laughter of the two most important people in his life wafting from the living room.

"Sasuke! You're still here?" Kakashi greets him with an expression that is more teasing than shocked over his eyes.

"Aa. Until the morning." He replies, stepping aside for the Hokage to come in.

"Kaka-sensei!" Sakura smiles sweetly next to a very distraught Naruto holding his head on the floor. 'Some things never change I guess.' Sasuke feels like his face might break if he keeps smiling, so he replaces it with a smirk.

"I could have sworn you were all still 12, ya'know." Kakashi jests, but the look in his eyes reminds him of a proud father looking at this adult children. Sasuke immediately dismisses that thought lest it lead him to a darker frame of mind.

"Awe, come on! We're grown ups now, ya'know!" The dobe whines.

"Grown ups don't call themselves grown ups while whining, you idiot!" Sakura raising her fist at him and he slowly makes to sit in the corner, far from her reach.

"So," Kakashi turns to Sasuke now. "I don't have much time, Naruto and I have a day full of meetings to get to, but I'd like to hear how your journey is going before we leave, Sasuke."

"Hn, it's... fine." He gives as his not-answer answer.

Kakashi, expecting this, gives him a more specific question. "Do you think you're almost ready to come home for good?"

"No." At this Kakashi looks at Sakura with worry in his eyes, but her persistent smile seems to shock him as he looks back at Sasuke.

"I guess I have to tell you anyway, since you're Hokage now..." Sasuke takes a deep breath and pinches the bride of his nose between closed eyes, bracing himself for more teasing.

"My S rank mission will begin tomorrow." Sakura interrupts him though. "You'll find everything you need on your desk, and all appropriate action has been taken for my hospital and my clinic duties, Hokage-sama." Sakura informs their sensei in an all business tone, but her face betrays her giddy.

Kakashi looks at him, then her, then back to him. "Well, it's about time." He tilts his head back at the pinkett who looks like she's just won the world. "Do you have everything you need? I can make further arrang-"

"No, no Kaka-sensei, Shisou and I already took care of everything." She's waving her hands in front of her in a very Sakura way. "No need to worry, we'll be fine. Thank you though."

"Right, well I'm happy for you two I guess." Shaking his now. "Come on, knucklehead stop hiding from Sakura, we've got stuff to do." He turns to leave and Sasuke and Naruto follow him, as they're all in the doorway Kakashi stop and gives a warning glare. "Be... Very careful Sasuke. Understand?"

"Don't worry Kaka-sensei I already got that part covered." Loudly whispering and half covering his mouth with an evil smile on his squinting face he tells their sensei, "I'll fill you in on the dirty details later."

Kakashi looks somewhat worried at both of his male students, "What-"

"Did you know teme has a big mole on his right butt cheek?" Naruto can't suppress his laughter now, his almost keeled over on the floor.

Sasuke is quick to push them out of the door and mumbles "Right well see you guys when we get back. Later." Before slamming the door in his loudly laughing friends' faces.

He walks back to the living room with his eyebrows scrunched. Sakura looks up from the tarp she's laying on the couch and asks "What is it, Sasuke-kun?"

"I didn't realize how much I missed them." He whispers, still not comfortable with being open. He scolds himself when he realizes he might be giving her false hope that they'll end up staying here.

But this is Sakura and she knows more about him than he knows about himself, so she walks over a pokes his forehead, smiling at his shocked expression. "They miss you too, but they understand." Then, poking his nose this time. "Besides, we'll see them when we get back."

"Sakura?" She looks up at him questioningly.

"Thank you for everything." He breathes before putting his forehead to hers.

"I love you too." She whispers back, before turning around continuing getting ready to leave everything she knows, for everything she loves.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ah, finally, we can get started on our travels. I decided to establish their relationship and get all of that out of the way before they left :)


	9. The Start of Our Travels

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I have no chill for cliffhangers.
> 
> Sorry not sorry.

Restlessness is a feeling he's become all too accustom to in his life. It started after the massacre; he'd be rendered entirely unable to stay still when the memories hit him, leading him to train for hours on end, even past the marks he set for his goals. When he was a teenager in Orochimaru's lair, the snake praised him almost daily for his near begging for things to do, missions to complete, training to get done.

After Itachi was dead, however, it was an entirely new form of restlessness. He'd only killed when necessary up until then, Itachi was the only person he wanted to kill. But after his death he itched for the kill. He became so overwhelmed with the need to hurt the people who had been happy and safe because of his and brother's pain that it had driven him very near insanity.

His restlessness now leads him to never stay in one spot for more than two weeks. If a place or a job from Kakashi looks like it'll take longer, he'll simply just forgo sleep in lieu of getting it done quicker. The moment he gets comfortable is the moment he might lose control of himself, and he can never allow that to happen again.

He realizes that he's been trapped in a rather dark train of thought, when a finger pokes his nose. It's not quite dawn yet, and he smells strong coffee in front of him as he opens his eyes at the kitchen table.

"Falling asleep on me, Sasuke-kun? You're the one who wanted to leave this early." She laughs as she sits beside him, smelling her coffee like an addict.

"No."

"Hm, well I was asking if you think we've forgotten anything?"

He looks over at the plethora of scrolls sticking out of his satchel and her back pack. She'd literally thought of everything. Before, he'd been lucky to have a blanket, and he was mildly amused at how different traveling would be now. "No, you've thought of everything." He takes a sip of his coffee to hide his smile.

"Right! Then, ready?" She gulps down the rest of hers, and when she sees him put his cup down, drinks the rest of his too.

"Aa."

When they arrive at the gates, the fall breeze is blowing red leaves calmly across the path, the only sound they can hear.

He's already braced himself for a huge and loud party to greet them, but only the sentries sit on duty, waving them off. He notices Sakura doesn't look back, and wonders if she's really as okay with this as she tells him she is.

They start running after a while; Sakura makes small talk about the little village they're headed to first, that's in need of repairs from a bad storm, and medical attention. He gives short sounds as replies, and she takes them as he means her to.

The village is on the border to the Hidden Rain Village, so even at full pace, they'll have to camp at least one night. Sasuke doesn't mind this; he never had time before to take in the beauty of this world. He was always travelling for his revenge, always with a goal ahead of him, never looking around, only forward towards his hatred. Now, he likes looking up at the stars, or feeding a stray cat in the woods, or simply seeing the forest, not just the trees. He could just use his Rinnegan and travel via the dimensions he has access to, but he's still not mastered it, and he likes the feel of his feet against the real ground.

Sakura starts dinner from the nearly full pantry she sealed away, and he goes about setting up their sleeping bags, and setting traps around the small clearing. Every time he pretends to look away, she yawns and he knows she's trying to hide how tired she is. He guesses she hasn't been on a mission in a while, hasn't run from dusk until the dead of night without a break in quite some time. He curses himself for not stopping sooner.

"Sasuke-kun! Dinner's ready!" She calls to him, holding up a plate full of ongiri.

"Aa." He walks up to her and takes one. He taste tomatoes in it, and can't hide the half smile that forms, she notices and blushes at him as she starts eating.

They sit barely touching by small fire, eating in silence for quite some time. He's not used to needing to talk anymore, the animals he comes by don't require it and even the people he helps barely speak to him. He notices that she keeps looking over at him every few moments, and sighs. "What is it Sakura?"

"Huh? Oh! Sorry Sasuke-kun..." She laughs nervously, "I didn't mean to stare."

"You always have," he deadpans.

She's red now and still laughing uncomfortably, "What? Yeah... I guess I have."

He raises an eyebrow to make her continue. "It's just... Well I never thought I'd be here again."

That makes him look around, surely she might have passed this part of the forest before, but he doesn't see anything of importance.

"No, no, not here really. I just mean, camping out on a mission... With you." The smile she gives him is sad, and makes him want to say something to reassure her. But he doesn't know what else to say, he's already said everything he feels.

So he taps her seal and gets up, extending his only hand for her. "Let's go to bed."

"R-right!"

He'll have to find a way to make everything up to her, he thinks as she falls asleep on his chest, this is his mission after all.

* * *

They've been in Ametaiga for two weeks now, the reconstruction is nearly complete, and all the residents are healed of their illness. When they arrived, Sakura found that most of them had gotten a lung infection from the mold caused by the flooding in the storm. She would come to their little shack every night hours later than he would, as exhausted as he'd seen her in the war.

Sasuke had decided to not say anything about her self-induced exhaustion, until tonight when she stumbles in the shack dead on her feet mumbling about give her a minute and she'll be ready to leave.

"Sakura, go to bed." He walks over to the table she's stubbornly packing on, and uses a conjured arm of Susanoo to pick her up and unceremoniously drop her on the cot.

As a testament to the state she's currently in, she hardly even yelps, and settles into the covers without much protest.

He hums in soft contentment to himself as he brushes the hair from her face, and then moves over to finish packing for her. One more night won't kill him, he convinces himself.

There's a soft knock on the door, and with it calm, lowly civilian chakra. He looks over at an undisturbed pinkette and doesn't hide the smile as he answers the door.

"Uhm, sorry to bother you Uchiha-san," the town leader's daughter says with a red face and bow.

"Hn?"

"A hawk came for you a couple of minutes ago," she lifts the tiny scroll up for him to take, "so uh, here you go." She flashes perfect teeth at him, and stammers through an invitation to her house he'd just finished repairing.

He promptly answers by shutting the door.

It's not a scroll he recognizes, he assumes it must be a request for work, or the dobe borrowing someone else's paper because he's too scatter brained to remember his own.

Using his teeth and his only hand, he carefully unrolls the tiny scroll and flattens it on the small table by splaying his hand.

_Sasuke-sama, I'm being held in the Village Hidden in the Grass. Orochimaru sent me here by myself to retrieve something and I lost control for a while. No one was hurt so if you come vouch for me they've ensured my release. The birds told me where to find you; I hope you haven't moved on yet._

_Sorry for being such a bother and I hope this finds you well._

_Always your servant,_

_Juugo_

With a long sigh, he looks over to the sleeping pinkette on the small worn down cot, and hopes she'll have enough energy for a long trek to the Grass Village.

'It would be good to see Juugo again,' he ponders as he lays down on the floor beside the cot and settles in to sleep for a few hours.

* * *

It's just before dawn when he's awoken by a soft moan coming from his left side. Sasuke sits up slightly to look at the girl sleeping there, her head tossing back and forth, pink hair sticking to her sweaty forehead.

"Sssasuke-kun," she mumbles in her sleep. He doesn't hold back his smirk, thinking that she's having an inappropriate dream about him.

He considers acting out what she must be dreaming about, as they haven't had sex in quite a while, but he's stopped at the next utterance.

"No… please… don't, no." She starts shaking slightly, and whimpers in her sleep.

Sasuke is frozen in place, unable to form a coherent plan of how to handle this. Sakura is beside him, on the small cot, having a nightmare about him. He swallows on a dry throat as he realizes it's probably of one of the times he's tried to kill her, so waking her up might result in the demolition of the small shack they've graciously been allowed to use.

He settles for sitting up fully and leaning against the cot so he can run his fingers through her hair, and whisper soothing words to the girl he's broken until the nightmare passes. He's no stranger to nightmares. In fact, he thinks, most of his nightmares these last years are about exactly what she must be seeing in her mind's eye.

He hates himself more than he ever has, as he comforts an unconscious Sakura from a dream he himself created. The restlessness is back, and he wants nothing more than to run the forest at the outskirts of town and burn everything down until the spasms of his body have subsided, but he promised himself he would make up for everything he's done to this beautiful, kind woman who's so obviously pained in her sleep.

Being faced with the evidence of her pain like this, is more a stab in the gut than any other repercussion of his sins he's encountered thus far. The look of hatred in her eyes a couple of weeks ago had hurt him of course, but that was a controlled glimpse she had given him to make him understand.

This was entirely different. This was something she couldn't hide; this was fear. At one point in his life, Sasuke had actively tried to make her fear him, so she wouldn't get to close, so he could hide himself away and so no one would dare care enough to try and find him.

He wonders to himself if these nightmares will ever stop, if he'll spend the rest of his life trying to fix what he's done and if none of it will matter. Maybe he's broken her too badly to ever be fixed, maybe this is all a mistake.

Maybe he should just get up, burn that scroll, and leave once more. Maybe he should hide himself away again, and this time never come back to her, maybe she'll be able to finally be happy.

One day, when he's nothing but a distant memory of a boy who hurt her, she won't have these nightmares anymore. One day she won't remember his face, or the love she had for him. One day, maybe she'll hate him properly, like any sane person would.

Can he do that though? He's jumped feet first into the rabbit hole of loving this woman, he's finally come face to face with the overwhelming fact that he loves her. Can he really just leave now, like he's done so many times before?

He's at a loss for an answer, as he continues to soothe her sleeping form, trying to comfort her as best he can.

"Don't… Leave me… I'll scream…"

His eyes snap wide, and his hand stops its ministrations.

Those words.

He knows those words very well. She yelled that at him the first time he left her, the first time she told him she him and he did nothing but thank her and knock her out.

Her nightmares are of him leaving? She told him that a few weeks ago after the bar, but he hadn't realized they were real, or that they would affect her that badly.

"Not until you tell me too," he whispers against her ear.

Maybe he can do this after all, if that's all she wants.

* * *

Shortly after Sakura woke up, they started the 3 day journey to the Grass Village. Instead of mentioning anything about the dream she obviously remembered, if her earlier scattered-brained-ness was an indicator, she spent the whole first day asking in depth medical questions about Juugo, and his condition.

By the end of the first day, Sakura was convinced she could concoct some form medication to help Juugo, where Orochimaru had failed, if he even tried at all. She spent hours sitting by torch and fire light, reading medical texts she'd sealed and brought with her.

The animation in her face from this new challenge she'd given herself was somewhat nostalgic for him. She looked how she always did in the academy when there was something new to learn.

He spends the rest of the night wondering how he hadn't always known that she'd become the most powerful kunoichi one day. Looking back now, it was all but obvious.

* * *

On the third day, they both sense a familiar chakra that sends shivers down their spines.

"Sasuke, is that…?"

They stop and scan the area, his Sharingan activated to see the chakra, and calculate its threat. And there, right under their feet is the remnants of a sickly purple chakra he's never been able to forget.

"Sakura, break the ground right," he walks away and points to the center of the chakra, "there."

With a single punch, the ground collapses in the center of the clearing, and Sakura leaps to his side with wide eyes.

"Sasuke-kun… How the hell?"

"We need to send a hawk to Kakashi, immediately."

Neither of them can look away from the crater, but he knows she's nodding, and he knows she's as terrified as he is.


	10. Let's Go Get Juugo

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Since it was such a cliff hanger last chapter, you all get a chapter right away! :D
> 
>  
> 
> Maybe with a lemon :o

"Sakura, break the ground right," he walks away and points to the center of the underground chakra, "there."

With a single punch, the ground collapses in the center of the clearing, and Sakura leaps to his side with wide eyes.

"Sasuke-kun… How the hell?"

"We need to send a hawk to Kakashi, immediately."

Neither of them can look away from the crater, but he knows she's nodding, and he knows she's as terrified as he is.

There, in the center of the crater is long decaying root, with row after row of dead white Zetsu attached to it. These Zetsu feel and look somewhat different from the ones he remembers in the past though, he can't see any of Hashirama's green chakra or Madara's blue chakra in them, or the root.

It's all purple.

Sickingly, terrifyingly purple.

Just like the Ten Tails looked to his Sharingan.

Just like Kaguya looked to him.

"I think Kaguya made these." Sakura mirrors his thoughts.

"Hn?" But she's already jumped down into the crater, like the annoying head strong woman that she is.

When he leaps down too, he sees her green chakra glowing over one of the Zetsu, prodding at it.

"This level of petrification would take a long time to happen."

"How long, exactly?"

"Hundreds if not thousands of years."

He watches in silence as Sakura ties back her now shoulder length hair, and removes her traveling cloak and backpack, and hands them to him. In the next moment, she's used a kunai to cut down the Zetsu she'd been examining.

"What are you doing, Sakura?" There's still chakra pooled in the root, and in the Zetsu, though it seems to be dormant. Still, he doesn't want to take any chances with her.

But Sakura's not to be messed with when her hair is up. He finally gets what the Dobe meant by that. She lays the body down on the floor of the crater she created and motions for her back pack. Sasuke decides he'll at least sit guard next to her, if she feels like playing scientist in a crater in the middle of nowhere.

Sakura removes a scroll marked with the kanji for "Tests" and unseals what he recognizes as a dissection kit. He stifles the shiver from the memory of Kabuto dissecting living "test subjects" when he was bored; and instead, decides to chuckle slightly at the fact that Sakura really _had_ thought of everything.

She starts by removing several samples of flesh, half of which she puts in glass jars from the scroll, and half she fuses to some formula written on said parchment. When it only fizzles for a moment, her brow furrows and she frowns.

Next, she prepares the body to be autopsied, and makes the first incision, opening the chest cavity up in a "Y" shape with clamps. She seems to pause at what she sees.

"What is it?"

"When I did the autopsies on the white Zetsu before and during the war, they didn't look like this."

Sasuke dips down to look closer, but the face, the body, everything appears to be the same. The chakra is definitely different, but this one looks like every Zetsu clone he's ever seen, apart from the black one's other half.

She seems to understand his confusion so she elaborates. "They're all plant based bodies, even this one. But…" She reaches in and pulls out what could only be described as once being a heart. The black, rocky thing has the same chakra remnant that the rest of the body has. He takes note that the chakra remnants remind him of the left over chakra pooling in a dead body, but for it to still be here after all this time, the chakra must have been immense, no doubt from the root of the divine tree. He nods for her to continue. "They never had organs before, not even a trace that they ever did."

He watches her excise and chisel off small samples of every organ she finds, and mulls over what she's telling him. A long forgotten vision given to him from Hagaromo surfaces and something seems to snap in his head.

"Kaguya made these, probably before the Sage of Six Paths was even born."

Sakura drops what's in her hands and stares at him like he has three heads again.

"These used to be people, they were put under the first Infinite Tsyuko no Me by Kaguya herself. The tree turned them into this, her army."

And yup, he smirks in his head, now she's looking at him like he had four heads. He thought his and Naruto's previous reincarnations had taken care of all of the remnants of the tree and its roots, but it seems they've missed a few meters. He sighs and moves to get up, decided on burning it all away.

"Hurry and finish up here, I'm going to destroy it."

Sakura seems to be frozen in place, like she's being weighed down by something or some revelation she has yet to share.

"Sakura?"

She's staring at what he'd decided at one time, long in the past, was a heart, once again in her hand. "Sasuke-kun… Why would someone as powerful as Kaguya need an army?"

Sasuke stops in his tracks and looks at her with wide eyes.

"Sasuke-kun, people didn't even have chakra back then. What would be the point of making such a powerful army?"

They stare at each other for what seems like hours, her obviously trying to answer her own question, and him trying to figure out how nobody, not even him, had thought to ask that question.

When she doesn't show any signs of moving, he walks back to her and starts packing away her things. "Come on, Sakura, we have to get out of here."

She seems to snap out of it, but the look on her face doesn't change as she seal the samples and her equipment away.

They stand on the edge of the crater, and Sasuke uses his Ametarasu to ensure that no one else will stumble upon their discovery and try to use it how it was used last time.

Neither of them moves until the black flames disappear.

Neither of them makes any moves to write a message to Kakashi, either.

* * *

They arrive in the Village Hidden in the Grass around midnight, and are swiftly shown to the best inn in the whole village, as war heroes. Sakura blushes uncontrollably and laughs nervously while waving her hands every time someone thanks her for saving everyone from the "dream world." She keeps telling them that it was more Sasuke who saved them, but they don't pay him much attention, knowing clearly who he is.

When they walk into the inn, Sakura keeps remarking that it's too grand, and he smiles at how damn annoying she's being.

"Hello! How many rooms can I get you?"

'Of course, it has to be a woman.' Sasuke pretends not to notice how she ogles at him and blushes, but of course, he notices as always. He has no problem with women as people, but fan girls are so god damned annoying, he can hardly stand to be what would pass as neutral to them.

"One room, if you don't mind." He glances over at Sakura's strained speech and finds that she's closer to cracking than he is. He can't help but smile at that.

Big mistake.

The woman doesn't seem to notice Sakura at all, and seems to be mesmerized by his small smile.

With a sigh, " _We'd_ like one room, with one bed."

Sakura chokes on her spit at his clarification of needing one bed, just as he'd hoped. The woman seems to notice the pinkette now, and gives her a _look_ that Sasuke knows is bringing her closer and closer to broken bones, so he quickly snatches the key from her outstretched hand before she can say anything else, and physically hauls Sakura down the hall.

Sakura huffs when they enter their room. It's definitely the grandest he's ever been in, a huge room with a full kitchen, its own bathroom off in the far corner, and a beautiful silk clad bed in the center of the room, with the biggest TV he's ever seen opposite it. "God, she was annoying!" Sasuke can't help but laugh a little too loudly at this.

"What? She was!"

Between sharp inhales of breath, he manages, "You were so much worse when we were kids, Sa-ku-ra."

She mumbles something he can't hear as they both strip from their gear and weapons.

"So, we're getting Juugo in the morning?"

"Aa."

"Are you…" She pauses to find the right word, "excited?"

He ponders this as he walks over to her, standing by the bed. "I suppose," he concedes.

She beams at him, like he's just told her something amazing.

He hates to ruin that smile, he really does, but it's necessary when he says, "We can't tell him about what we found today. We can't tell anyone yet."

She doesn't miss a beat however, "Well duh, Sasuke-kun! What, do you think I'm stupid? I'm still not entirely sure what we _did_ find this morning."

"Hn."

After a pause, he decides that's enough discussion for the night, as he leans down to kiss her with force. Her eyes go wide, and her cheeks tinge a pretty shade of pink that reminds him of her hair, but she accepts the kiss. Just as their eyes shut, and her arms are slung around his neck, he feels her tongue prodding for entrance at his lips, and he obliges without a thought.

While he has her distracted with his tongue, he moves his only hand to tug on the strings at the front of her obi, removes it and tosses it at their feet. He breaks the kiss to lift her dress over her head, and moves back to her mouth without missing a beat. Her hands begin the frantic actions of trying to get his shirt off as well, but when he thumbs over a rosy nipple, she growls and decides to rip his long sleeved black shirt to shreds instead.

He laughs as pushes her onto the bed and stands over her, taking in the sight before him, a half-naked Sakura is the most beautiful thing he thinks he's ever seen. She seems to mirror his sentiment, for when he looks at her face, he sees her eyes raking over his chest.

With a smirk, he bends down and hooks his fingers under the waist band of both her shorts and panties and yanks them down with force. He expects her to blush or look embarrassed, as she has been the other two times they've done this since that first night nearly a month ago, but she simply opens her legs slightly and smirks back at him.

He revokes his earlier thought, _this_ is the most beautiful thing anyone has ever seen in the history of beauty, he decides as he crawls on top of her to nip and suck at her pulse line. He sees her bite her lip at this, and decides to push it further, biting a little harder and by the hand that knots itself in his hair and the little gasp that escapes her lips, he assumes she likes that.

He continues placing teasing bite marks down her pulse line, and then trails down between her breasts. When his trail of bites lands just below her navel, she giggles and opens her legs wider in anticipation.

Never in his life did he think he'd be here, in a huge room gifted to them for being the heroes of the world, about to have his fill of the annoying pinkette who would chase after him and annoy him to end. Sasuke has to admit, he's quite pleased with it all now.

He's still terrified he's doing something wrong, when he starts prodding at her with his tongue, drawing nonsense patterns over the most sensitive part of her body, but he feels nothing but overwhelming joy when she breathes out his name.

He's been afraid of being happy for so long, like it was somehow disrespecting his dead clan if he found any happiness, but she's making him think maybe they'd be happy _for_ him finding her. He's been afraid of making himself comfortable, since he started this journey, afraid he'd lose himself again if he let himself go, but now she's starting to make him think he can be comfortable with her, and that she'll help he be the man he needs to be.

She reaches down and squeezes his only hand, lacing their fingers together, and he takes that as an "almost" though the only things coming out of her mouth are wanton moans and broken strings of his name. He picks up the pace of his tongue, and in one beautiful moment, he witnesses her back arch and her face contort in the most beautiful way. He's long since activated his Sharingan so that these images will forever be emblazed in his memory, though he knows just seeing it won't do being here between this woman's legs justice.

When her breathing starts to settle again, he crawls up her body, to plant sweet kisses all over her face. After such a powerful orgasm, he half expects her to want to stop for the night, but when he reaches her face she grabs his hair and kisses his lips with bruising force. Balanced on one hand, he can't do much but enjoy the kiss, and luckily for him, she realizes this and moves her hands to tear at his pants.

In one deft motion, his grey pants are in pieces on the floor, and she's aligned him where he wants to be. He tentatively pushes in and loses his breath, breaking the kiss, at how amazing it feels. How is it that he keeps forgetting how completely perfect being inside of her feels? He moves at a lazy pace, trying to keep her from any pain, but it seems Sakura has other plans.

With and "oof" she flips them over, and he can only chuckle at her enthusiasm. The rapid, frantic pace she sets isn't helping him keep much control over his body, and half of him wants to tell her to slow down so it'll last. But the other, winning half is causing him buck his hips up into her, reveling at the pleasure and how deep he can be in her like this.

In a moment like this, when all walls are down around himself, and Sakura is clawing at him, herself, the bed, anything she can reach for the pleasure he's giving her, he thinks maybe just maybe this is what being in love with someone is like.

The tightening in his belly is about to snap when he pulls her down by pink locks and meets her lips desperately. With a grunt, his whole body goes ridged he can't help but ride out the bliss as he she milks him for everything he's worth.

When it's all over, she collapses onto his chest and giggles to herself.

When he can speak, "What's so funny?"

"You need to get clothes that are easier to take off," she tells him in a whisper against his ear.

"You just need better self-control."

She laughs and breathes an "I love you," as she gets off of him and pads over to the bathroom. A part of him that seems to be growing every day he's with her misses her warmth on top of him. So he smiles fully when she stops at the door and turns, all ethereal goddess in the moonlight from the wall of windows, and calls to him, "You coming, or what?" and disappears into the bathroom.

Like she even had to ask.

* * *

In the morning, he's greeted with half-hearted bitching about the bruises she has to heal all over her neck, which he quickly retorts by throwing what's left of his clothes from yesterday at her.

The two go hand in hand (which Sasuke pretends not to notice, and Sakura is blushing like mad at), to the jail facility in the back of the small village. As they promised, it only took a few minutes, and a couple of signatures from both of them to release Juugo, who meets them in the back of the building.

"Sasuke-sama, I'm so sorry to be a bother." He bows deeply, and asks for Sakura's name.

"Sakura Haruno," she tells him with her radiant smile. Juugo gives him a knowing look at this. He never made any hint that he cared for outwardly, but he knows in the delirium of injury and the throes of a nightmare, he's said her name once or twice. The way Juugo smiles at her seemingly ecstatic she's with him, tells Sasuke maybe it was more than once or twice.

As per his release orders, the trio quickly vacates the Grass Village, on their way to take Juugo to one of Orochimaru's hideouts. Of course, he protested vehemently, but Sakura was the one to convince him, saying she wanted to try some drug combinations she'd need a lab for.

When Sakura couldn't hear, Sasuke made sure Orochimaru wouldn't be at that particular hideout.

It would be a pleasant two day travel he decided, as they walked along the path at a lazy pace. Sakura had that certain something that Naruto had. Everyone loved her immediately, and by the way Juugo smiled and answered her numerous and very personal questions, he knew she'd just made one more lifetime friend.

That was just the kind of person she was, having decided before ever meeting Juugo that she'd dedicate as long as it took to helping him. He definitely could learn about how to be the person he wants to be, the person his brother wanted him to be, from this woman.

He smiles, as he walks behind them.

Yes, maybe this is what being in love is like.


	11. Onwards to the HIdeout

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sigh... I hate Karin... I really do, but I tried to write her in character, but a little less cringy. I don't character bash in my stories, so I didn't want to be like aaaah fuck Karin, ya'know?
> 
> This is how I see her becoming their actual friends, let me know if you agree!

Sasuke has always thought of himself as a smart man, he really has. Now, even in his academy days he'd admit (only to himself) that Sakura Haruno was one of the only people in his life he considered smarter than him. In his genin days Shikamaru's genius weaseled its way up there with Sakura and the jonin. Regardless of all that, Sasuke still had always known he was a genius, maybe not as much as Itachi, but a genius nonetheless.

So why, oh why, had he only asked if _Orochimaru_ would be at this hide out?! The stupidity of his optimism was something he could only blame on Sakura, as she looked at him half about to fall over laughing and half about to murder someone.

The moment they had gotten near the hide out near the Hidden Grass, a little after dark, the very one Sakura had pointed out that she'd seen him for the first time in when they were 15; the _most_ annoying woman in the world had come bouncing out of the exposed rock doors.

And he may have several times referred to his companion as the most annoying woman in the world, but that was _good_ annoying, you see. To Sasuke Uchiha, every person on this planet was annoying, some he didn't care about, like his fan girls, some were good annoying like Naruto, Sakura and most of his comrades, and then there was Karin.

Fucking Karin.

Now, he knew part of his redemption counted for her as well, he'd come a lot closer to killing her than he did to any other comrade. And it's not that he hated her, looking back on his life he had realized about a year ago that Itachi had always been right; he'd never really hated anyone, other than Danzou and the other village Elder's. But they were all gone now. He'd seen to Danzou's destruction himself and the other two elders had mysteriously been exiled from the Land of Fire the same day Itachi's name had been added to the Uchiha monument more than two years ago. He never knew who was behind it, but Sakura and Tsunade's smug smiles had clued him in a little bit.

So he could admit in his new self-aware state, that he neither hated this woman nor wanted her dead, but he did want her to get off of him right now.

"Sasuke-kuuuun!" the red-head cooed loudly, "I missed you sooooo much! Why are you here? Oh never mind! Come on, come on! Let's get you inside, you probably need a bath! I'll set one up! Oh, do you need help? Only having one arm, I'm sure you do! I would be happy to help, as your physician!"

She literally did not shut up (he was becoming slightly worried she hadn't breathed either), the entire way into the hide out. As she led them through the labyrinth he knew all too well, she clung onto his good arm so he couldn't push her off like he used to. If she noticed Juugo and Sakura, she hadn't let on yet.

"Karin, get off," he tried in a calm tone, but she continued on with her ramblings as she led them to the updated, and he had to admit much brighter than before, living quarters.

"Karin, _off!_ " he was louder and clearly showing his disdain now.

Never discouraged enough, she simply tsked as she moved away from him to unlock a door. "You're no fun, Sasuke-kun! I was just being friendly!"

"If you were being friendly, you could have greeted us as well, Karin-san." It was Juugo who spoke up behind him. He could feel Sakura's amused scowl behind him as well.

"Oh right, Pinky, Bipolar, what'cha doing here too?" Karin threw over her shoulder as they follow her into a long hall of new looking bedrooms. At the end of the hall was where he remembered a large empty room with only a snake skeleton had once resided. Now, it seemed Karin had redecorated and made it into a very large but plain looking modern living room. The woman had even convinced the old snake creep to get her a TV he noticed.

Sakura stopped at his side at the entrance to the room and cleared her throat. "Hello to you too, Karin," she said with strained politeness and a twitching smile he'd been seeing since they were children. "Sasuke-kun and I just went and got Juugo-san, and I'd like to use your lab here to see if I can help Juugo-san with his condition."

Karin gave an incredulous laugh, "Help him? If Kabuto, Orochimaru-sama and _I_ couldn't help him, what makes you think you can, Pinky?"

Sakura's not very well hidden anger boiled off of her as she said through gritted teeth, clearly showing behind her cracking smile, "You don't know the half of what I can do, Karin. I'd be happy to show you though."

Sasuke and Juugo exchanged glances, both knowing Karin's temper. They weren't worried about the redhead though. The pinkette was legendary, even to Juugo, having already surpassed her Sanin teacher, without enhancement and a blood line like he did, and without a tailed beast as Naruto had. She was a class of her own, and if they wanted the hide out to last much longer, they needed to stop the two annoying women immediately.

He sighed to himself, his journey was more entertaining with Sakura but he never had to constantly try to defuse bombs like this when he was alone. Pros and cons, he guessed, everyone had them.

Juugo was the first one to speak, his serene voice came out the moment Sasuke nodded, "Karin-san, we're very tired from our journey, perhaps you could show us to our rooms, and we can start the experiments Sakura-hime would like to preform tomorrow."

Sasuke could have face palmed. 'Good going Juugo, calling Sakura a princess in front of this woman.'

Karin seemed to not have noticed however, and her face lit up for a reason he couldn't discern. "Well, at least somebody is making sense. You guys get some rest, yeah!" She put her finger to her chin and gave an evil smile. "You can play at your science experiments tomorrow! Now, I have two bedrooms other than my own with furniture. Sorry! I wasn't expected company."

Sasuke raised an eyebrow as she blushed and walked up to him with her hands clasped in front of her. When she was close enough that she could smell the cinnamon off of her, she cooed in his ear, "Looks like we'll just have to share a room, Sasuke-kun!"

And that's all it took. Sasuke quickly had to form the Susanoo around himself and Karin, as Sakura's chakra filled punch came at the redhead. Everyone but Sakura gave a shocked gasp when her fist made contact, not from the fact that she lost her temper, they'd been waiting for that.

Her fist settled inside a crack she'd made in his ultimate armor. Her hand was lodged a good inch into the purple bones. Karin looked at Sasuke with unmistakable fear in her eyes, and he nodded. Hopefully that'd shut her up for the rest of his life. One could only hope.

When Sakura realized she'd almost killed the redhead and Sasuke as well, she backed away from the purple aura and started laughing in that nervous way that she had, while waving her arms.

Letting go of Karin and dispelling Susanoo, he nodded to the other two that all was safe; He quickly checked to make sure Juugo wasn't going to lose it next. Honestly, how did someone with her temper plan to fix Juugo's anger issues?

"Right, well. Karin, Sakura and I will take one of those rooms, Juugo, do as you wish."

With absolute, slightly terrified silence, they were shown their room just down the hall, and Sakura was pointed in the direction of the lab.

* * *

Once they were alone, "I've always liked Karin!" Sakura said happily to Sasuke.

He nearly fell over. "Explain," was all he could say to that.

"Oh, she's annoying, yeah. But so am I Sasuke-kun! After we found her back then we talked a few times. She's weird of course, but we all are. And she…" Sakura seemed to ponder how to put it to him so he'd understand her crazy line of thinking, "she reminds me a lot of how I used to be," she decided.

Sasuke thought about this long and hard as they unpacked their gear. "Then why'd you attack her just now?" seemed to be the most logical question he could think of.

"Why'd it take you both losing an arm to get you and Naruto to be best friends again?" she countered.

Well, she had him at that.

"I'm gonna go get some blood samples from Juugo-san and see what herbs Karin has here, don't wait up." Sakura told him, pulling out several scrolls marked with various medical symbols.

"Are you sure being alone with Karin is wise so soon?"

"She's only like that around you, we'll be fine." She winked and walked over to kiss his cheek, he hated the way it was left warm from her lips. He dismissed her with a forehead poke and went towards the bathroom before she even left.

* * *

The warm water from the shower did wonders for his sore muscles, though he had to admit he much rather being showering with a certain pinkette. With a sigh, he decided he'd indulged enough about 30 minutes into his shower and got out.

Sasuke wiped the condensation from the large mirror and looked at his reflection for the first time in days. His hair was still much longer over his Rinnegan eye, his normally pale complexion was slightly sun-tanned and his face seemed… brighter? He'd noticed it the last time he looked at himself too, in puddle back in Ametaiga. His face had looked happy, even if it was blank. The dark circles he'd become accustomed to seeing under his eyes were entirely gone. Sakura was even managing to change his appearance.

His eyes trailed down to the half arm at his left side and pondered Sakura's early rhetoric. _Why'd it take you both losing an arm to get you and Naruto to be best friends again?_

He didn't exactly have an answer for that, he'd been trying to come up with one every time he saw his half arm, or felt a phantom pain over the last two years.

He'd come up dry every time.

But what he did know, even the first time he'd woken up in the hospital and Tsunade had gone on about a limb replacement, was that he needed to keep it the way it was. Though he was unclear of the lessen losing this limb had taught him, he knew somehow that he needed to be reminded of it every day. He couldn't go back to how he was when he was a whole man, losing this arm had marked him gaining part of himself back.

Maybe that was it, he pondered as he shook his image from his head and moved to get dressed, maybe he just needed to reminded of what he had almost lost, what he had almost taken.

What he had almost become.

As he'd come to accept himself, he'd had to face the fact that he had, indeed wanted to kill Naruto and Sakura. He had wanted them to be the first of the long list of people he'd kill to create his new world. He couldn't simply deny it and shove it aside as a fluke as Naruto had done, and told him to do. He had to embrace the fact that he had wanted them to die, and die by his hand. By remembering and accepting that fact, he was sure to never make the same decisions that led him to that line of thinking ever again.

When he was fully dressed and sleeping nor eating seemed to sound like a good idea at the moment, he decided to go find Sakura and Karin and make sure everything was up to snuff. He hadn't heard any screams or explosions, so nothing bad had happened yet, he surmised, but always better safe than sorry.

As he walked in the direction of the lab Karin had earlier pointed out, he was once again taken aback by how much even this place had changed. Though still creepy and bringing back bad memories, he had to admit it seemed so much more vibrant, maybe even full of life.

Even if one of the world's most crazy and annoying person lived here.

He nearly tripped over his own feet when he heard the unmistakable laugh of the girl he was now fully convinced he was in love with mixed with the cackle of the redhead he wished he could hate. As he rounded the corner and walked through the opened door, he found them both looking into microscopes, with sake in hand, laughing with each other.

"Sasuke-kun!" they both blurted out in unison, which only served to make them both laugh even louder.

Honestly, he'd left her alone for only about an hour, and she'd already made friends with a woman who he'd expected to hate her, and was very clearly drunk. He honestly couldn't take the woman anywhere!

"Hn, Sakura," when she gave him a scolding look over her alcohol flushed cheeks he added, "Karin."

"We're almost done for the night, darling!" Sakura said in a voice that reminded him of bells. She blushed when she realized she'd called him darling, but seemed to be pleasantly surprised when he didn't comment, and only walked up to tap her forehead.

Karin said nothing, but seemed to hold some form of warmth he couldn't place as she looked at the couple. What had happened while he was showering? "Want a drink, Sasuke-kun?" the woman offered.

"Hn," was his reply as she poured him a big glass of his own, he quickly gave Sakura a look to make sure it was safe to drink it to which she nodded, and reveled in the burn down his throat as he gulped the whole thing.

Pouring himself another, he settled at the couch in the corner and watched women laughing and talking about Ino and new medical advances since the war, and running tests on Juugo's blood together. Whatever had happened while he was in the shower, it seemed Karin shared the same feelings Sakura had, and even called her by her name about half the time.

About two hours into their "party" as Karin had called it, though drinking in front of microscopes only seemed to be an entertaining pastime of theirs and the fifth Hokage's so he didn't really agree to that sentiment, Sakura excused herself to go to bed, wobbling out of the room with a giggle. He was about to follow her, when an idea racked at his brain.

"Karin," he called out, trying with all of his might to keep the slurring out of his voice, if she knew he was drunk, she might try to rape him or something, and though he'd be able to put a stop to it, he would not be able to put a stop to Sakura's fists as easily.

The redhead stopped her tidying set up of the lab for the night and looked over at him, adjusting her glasses. "Yes, Sasuke-kun?"

"What happened when I was in the shower?" Hopefully she'd be more candid than he could Sakura to.

She giggled and went to sit down at the opposite side of the couch. "We got drunk," was all she seemed to have to say.

Okay, maybe with different wording? By god, this woman would explain something to him, and why wasn't she being annoying (not that he minded), was it the alcohol? He hated being in the dark about anything, which he admitted was hypocritical as he'd kept everyone who cared about him in the dark for most of his life. "You two seem friendly now?" he made sure to put the question in his voice.

"Yes."

With a sigh, "Karin."

"It was her chakra, and Naruto-kun's, and well, all of the Hidden Leaf's chakra," she explained. He raised an eyebrow, showing her he wasn't following. "It was so warm, and when she saved my life, when you tried to kill me…" she trailed off and pushed up her glasses.

"Sorry," he mumbled.

She nodded, "She was crying when she saved me. She could have probably achieved her goal if she had killed me, but she saved me and cried instead," she explained further with a sad smile.

"So that's why you're friends now?" He tried to ignore the stabbing in his chest from the memory of having almost killed them both. So Sakura had cried that day too? Of course she had. He mentally added those tears to the growing list of tears he had to make up for with her smiles.

"No, there's a lot you don't know about women, Sasuke-kun." He snorted his affirmation to that one, causing her to smile more brightly. "I thought I loved you, maybe I did, maybe I do… I'm not sure."

He averted his gaze at that; the word love had always made him uncomfortable, even from Sakura.

"But she knows. And we were rivals, even if we didn't know each other, rivals for your love and attention. But the thing about her and me is, I didn't even want your love, or your happiness. I just selfishly wanted you."

He scoffed, seemed true enough, but nodded for her to continue.

"But she cried for me, and for you. She loved you so much she was willing to kill you to stop what that path you were taking, while I just blindly made it worse, so you'd stay with me. I wouldn't have even minded if you'd have killed me."

He knew he was staring, but this side of Karin was so raw, so new to him, he couldn't help it. If she'd have ever talked to him like this before, maybe they could have been real friends, never lovers, but friends.

"So anyway, the thing you need to know about rivals for love is, you're only rivals until one of you wins. And she won." She waved her hand like this didn't bother her in the least. "But a girl like her would have smiled and been happy for you even if you had chosen me, or another, or no one at all. As long as you were happy, she would have smiled and been happy just because you were. So I'm gonna try that Sasuke-kun!" She turned to face him, giving him a genuine, and he had to admit pretty smile. "As long as you're happy, I'll be happy for you!"

She got up and walked away to continue her tidying. He was dumbfounded with all of this new information, and decided to get his drunken ass to bed. Just as he reached the door, Karin's call stopped him and he turned to face her.

"But Sasuke-kun, if she ever makes you unhappy, I'll be waiting. Kaaay Sasuke-kuuuun?" she cooed in her annoying manner, winking at him.

She was back to her old self now, but Sasuke couldn't find it in himself to be annoyed at it, so he just smiled and said "Whatever, Karin," as he waved her away.

Maybe like that, they could actually be friends. And like most wondrous things in this new life of his, it was all thanks to that damned annoying woman he found passed out in the chair beside their bed, with only one pant leg off.

If she could do that to him and Karin, he had little doubts she'd be able to completely fix Juugo in no time.


	12. Annoying (and sometimes insane) women

Sasuke's life quickly became a routine seemingly overnight. He'd wake up every day beside Sakura, have some steamy, though half-awake on both of their parts, sex then they'd both gulp down a whole pot of coffee before joining Juugo and Karin. From there, they'd all go off to the lab to start more research into Juugo's condition and possible cures or treatments. After about an hour (almost like clockwork) Karin and Sakura would disagree on something or simply just get in each other's ways and the shrill yelling would ensue. That always served as Sasuke's cue to vacate with Juugo before he went berserk.

To calm down, Juugo would go outside the underground base to talk to the birds or something, Sasuke wasn't sure, but he used this opportunity to raid Orochimaru's extensive collection of ancient scrolls looking for anything remotely related to the Otsotsuki or Kaguya, or any ancient threat that could possibly warrant the need for an army the size a Tsuko No Me would create.

He was basically grasping at straws; he had yet to find anything at all.

After the girls destroyed something or made up in laughing fits (women were beyond him), they'd all gather to eat something Juugo cooked (the first few days he cooked, but nobody seemed to enjoy copious amounts of tomatoes and both Sakura and Karin started fires when attempting to cook a real meal). After a meal, usually marked with the loud chatter of Sakura and Karin about what they'd discovered that morning, they'd all go to the training rooms he'd perfected his techniques in in his youth, and spar. When Sakura had destroyed the room, and he had sent it ablaze, Juugo would fix everything for their next use.

The girls would spend hours working into the night, usually drunk, and Sasuke and Juugo would watch and read in silence, or play a game of Shogi between breaking up drunken fights. People thought he and Naruto were bad, but they seemed to overlook how Sakura had always been with the Yamanaka girl, how she is now with the red head.

And like that, three weeks of his life went by.

The longest he'd stayed in one place since just after war when he couldn't make it out of bed by himself.

And yet, he didn't find himself becoming restless. He wanted to go scout for more roots like Sakura and he had nearly a month ago, but didn't deem it an urgent matter. Even if he did that now, he even thought of coming back to this place.

Weird.

This all led him to tonight, his 22nd night at this particular hideout, watching Sakura pour Karin another drink without looking away from the medical text in front of her, the dim light of the lab dulling her pink locks to a pretty orangish color. The bottle slipped from her hand, and her face contorted to something like shock.

Sasuke was just about to go up to her with the trash bin think the habit she'd picked up from her Shishou had finally caught up to her and she was about to puke or something, when she started squealing and jumping up and down like a little girl about to see her crush (so pretty much how she looked every time he saw her for years).

"Sakura?" he asked, a little worried maybe this was some effect of so much alcohol. He swears he's never seen someone drink so much, but according to what Naruto had told him in a letter once, the day she came of age her and Tsunade had taken to nightly bar outings, so he'd been letting her do what she wanted.

"It's Ino-pig!" Sakura said between squeals, "She wants to meet me back in an outpost on the border to the Land of Fire; she's on a mission there and has something to tell me!" She looked so happy as she said it he couldn't help but smile.

"If she's connected to your brain, why can't she just tell you now?" Sasuke questioned.

Karin looked at him like he was an idiot, and Sakura glared. Behind him, Juugo coughed to hide a laugh. What? Did he miss something here?

"That's no fun, Sasuke-kun! She's my best friend, and she has something important to tell me, can we go? Can we go?" Dear God, she had never looked more like her child self before, even in his memories of her _as_ a child.

Sasuke walked up to her with a serious face he knew would deter her; he waited precisely long enough for her smile to fall before poking her seal with two fingers. "Aa, we'll go tomorrow." After a moment, he remembered the giant pile of scrolls he had yet to get through, "Or do you want to finish here first?"

She shook her head animatedly, "Ino-pig's only gonna be there for the next couple of days, can we come back after we see her? I've almost got it!"

He'd already broken his rule by 8 full days, what was a couple more? "Aa."

"Great! I'll go start packing! OH!" She turned to Karin, just now remembering she was even there. "Is that alright Karin-chan? That we leave and come back?"

"Yeah, but you could leave Sasuke-kun if you wanted! I think it's time for his physical, Pinky!" Karin loudly fake whispered to her, while eyeing him like he was a juicy steak.

Sakura just giggled and swatted at Karin's arm, before disappearing out of the lab.

More annoying women, wonderful.

* * *

The journey to the border camp Ino was helping with a flu outbreak at was for the most part uneventful.

That is, for Sakura at least.

The second night when they were only about six hours out from their destination Sakura had fallen asleep rather quickly, after spending the whole day talking about how excited she was to see Ino. Honestly, she'd seen her less than three months ago! Sasuke had regularly gone longer than that without so much as a letter from his friends on this journey, but he conceded that they were just that much more different.

It had been such a lovely clear night that Sasuke had decided to take a walk by the moon light. Not really looking for anything or anywhere in particular, he stayed close enough that he'd be able to hear Sakura's chakra punches if anything happened.

After about a 30 minute trek, he found himself at the edge of the tree line, and upon a small stream running as far as he could see. He aimlessly decided to follow it, enjoying the silence and the fresh air to clear his thoughts. He loved Sakura but she was definitely annoying, not that he minded so much now, but he needed time to shut his brain off nonetheless.

He made it about 40 meters down the stream when he felt it.

He activated his Sharingan and sent chakra to charge his Rinnegan and looked through the trees on the other side of the stream. He detected no life, not even small animals, but under the lifeless woods was that sickening purple haze.

Kaguya's chakra was here too?

No, it was the ancient tree's chakra.

The dormant but slowly churning chakra took the shape of the other one they'd come across, almost the exact shape of the root underneath. This section appeared to be smaller, but there was no mistake, even at this distance that this was the same thing they'd found nearly a month ago.

He was torn, he could disrupt their trip and go investigate or he could just pass it by as he no doubt had been his entire life. The chakra was so faint that he had little doubts that he had been encountering it his entire life without ever noticing, until he got a good look at Kaguya's and learned from Hagaromo what to look for. With a sigh, he picked a compromise for himself.

With much reluctance, he made sure to leave tracks for him to follow later, and made his way back to Sakura. He'd sneak away while she was with Ino tomorrow or the next day, and come back here. Traveling alone, he would be able to cut his travel time in half but he still needed her to be preoccupied with something for an entire day for that to work.

He wasn't entirely sure why he was planning to hide this from Sakura, but he wasn't thinking too much into it. She had enough to deal with, what with helping Juugo and obviously missing her home for him. Also, he didn't want to see the look of fear he'd seen on her face back at the other root fragment ever again.

But on the other hand, he knew if anything came of this and he was forced to tell her one day, she'd no doubt kick his ass within an inch of his life for thinking her weak.

As he walked back up to the campsite and sat next to quietly snoring Sakura, he racked his brain to try and discern why he felt the need to hide this from her. He didn't think her weak, not anymore at least, if it weren't for her they'd never have beat Kaguya after all. But still, it was normal to feel the need to protect the one you love from something like this right? He'd have to ask Naruto next time he sent him a letter.

With a snort, he changed his mind. He'd ask Kakashi instead.

* * *

"FOREHEEEEEAD!" The loud blond was closing in on them fast, her arms stretched out and her face expressing clearly her excitement.

As if in a battle, Sasuke quickly dodged out of the way as blond met pink, and a loud shrieking noise pierced his ear drums with excruciating force.

"Ino-pig! I missed you!" The smile on Sakura's face numbed the pain in his ears slightly as she tightened the embrace on his former #2 fan girl.

"Oi! Hey Sasuke-kuuuun!" Ino waved over to him with one arm still around his lover.

It felt like walking into a burning building as he walked closer to the pair, the energy released from them nearly burning at him. Instead of being a contagious form of excitement like it was for most people, it only served to utterly exhaust him.

And they hadn't even walked into the encampment yet.

He was just about to concede that he knew why their lazy and nearly as socially stiff as he was Sensei remained single to this day when Sakura shuffled away from the beaming blond and placed a calming finger on his nose. She winked at him before turning back to the Yamanaka, "Ino! Sasuke-kun and I are hungry! Is there a quiet place we could go eat?" After a beat she added, "Oh and you can tell me your news while we're there!"

"Yes, yes! Come on you two!" the blond shouted with her fist pumping in the air.

The fact that he had to sneak away to go investigate that root fragment was quickly becoming his salvation.

Ino took them to a small café he noted to himself that his brother would have enjoyed, and they took a booth in the very back. Sakura and he sat on one side of the small table, with him boxed in next to wall and their animated friend took the other side.

After a moment of the girl's talking about the latest gossip from the village, the waiter (he was pleased to see it was a male, so he'd only have two giggling girls to deal with) came up to take their orders.

"Pudding and two bottles of sake for me!" Ino told him with what Sasuke might refer to as a blatant attempt at a charming smile; though he'd only ever thought Sakura could pull one off.

He was just about to stammer through a quiet order, when Sakura interjected for him, without missing a beat as always. "He'll have a bowl of rice and do you have any tomatoes this time of year?" The waiter nodded to her, a slight blush on his cheeks that Sasuke tried to ignore. "Great! He'll take…" She tapped a finger on her chin and looked at him as if trying to size him up. He simply raised an eyebrow, and she turned back to flustering young man. "Four of your juiciest tomatoes! I'll have some anmitsu with extra syrup and two bottles of sake as well," she finally finished with a brilliant smile that could even melt Sasuke's heart.

He kicked her under the table, damn pinkette.

When the outrageous amount of sake was brought out for the mini-Tsunade's he found himself with, they both poured themselves three glasses in a row, toasting to various girly things he didn't quite understand. Finally, they slowed their drinking and Sakura poured him a glass and slid it over with a sideways glance that did odd things to his breathing, he nodded his thanks and stared at the wood grain.

He knew he had no place in this conversation, but he also knew neither of them minded as they once would have. They both had accepted him and would be content with him eating and drinking in silence. He was grateful, he liked his talks with Sakura but being overly social was tiring and the blond had already worn him down.

"So, Pig what's the big news you dragged me all the way here for?" Sakura asked on her fifth glass of sake, when the food was finally brought out to them. He noticed that their food had extra garnishes and portions, while his was nearly thrown on the table; the waiter had been flustered leaning over his pinkette.

The blond held her hand to chin, unnaturally tapping with four fingers instead of one or two.

"Oh, I don't know Sakura- _chan_. You'd usually be observant enough to tell me," she cooed and gave her a challenging look he recognized from their childhood along with a sly smile.

"What are you—" she started off at normal volume, before screeching so loudly that he almost fell over. "Oh my god, Ino! What the hell is that!?" When Sakura grabbed Ino's hand and stared in utter awe, he couldn't help but lean in closer to see what the fuss was about while he poured himself another glass of alcohol to wash down his second (heavenly) tomato.

There, on the blonde's left ring finger was the biggest diamond he's seen outside of Feudal Lords' treasures.

Said blond giggled and snatched her hand away to examine the rock. "Yeah, he went a little overboard didn't he?"

"A little!? It's huge!" Sakura gasped out. He couldn't help but snort his agreement, the thing was so gaudy he questioned if Shinobi were even allowed to wear it on missions.

"He read in a book that the size of the diamond is supposed to tell a girl how much you love her or something, so he bought the biggest one he could find!" Ino blushed and giggled louder at Sakura's still gaping face.

"So you and Sai are really getting married?" Sakura downed another glass, quickly abandoning even the pretense that she and Ino were here to eat. Ino did the same.

"Yup! We haven't set a date or anything, but Sakura…" Her face became serious for a moment, as she grabbed both of Sakura's hands across the table. "Will you be my maid of honor? I mean, you kind of have to!"

Sakura gave him a wary look before turning back to blond. "I-Ino, I don't know abou—" she was cut off by a raised hand.

"Nonsense! You don't have to help in the planning or anything, your tastes are far too simple to plan my wedding, besides Mother already went about hiring the best wedding planner in Konoha! You just have to show up and stand next to me, and get drunk with me afterwards!" Ino shot a warning glance in Sasuke's direction, and his chest started to tighten slightly.

They both just assumed that he wasn't going to let her attend her best friend's wedding when she so obviously wanted to? Did they think he cared nothing for her happiness?

"Ino, still..." Sakura took a slow steadying breath before downing cup number seven. "We're in the middle of travelling and I've just started a new project, I don't kno—"

"Send us a hawk with the date," Sasuke interrupted her, speaking for the first time in nearly an hour. Both women stared at him with wide eyes. "She'll be there," he added with closed eyes, taking a sip of his drink.

"Sasuke-kun, but… Are you sure?" He wasn't looking at her but he knew without a doubt she was looking close to tears.

"Do not insult me by assuming I'll keep you from what makes you happy ever again, Sakura," he warned her, casting a sideways glance at her gaping face while pouring himself another glass. "Of course you're going, it's what you want isn't it?"

"Y-yes. Of course." The pinkette had a pretty dusty rose coloring to her cheeks now, and he found himself wanting to pinch them.

With that thought, he promptly abandoned his glass on the table.

Once both of the women recovered from the whole ordeal, they spent hours talking and laughing about everything they could think of, long after the sake ran out. He sat enjoying the sound of her voice without really paying attention to what it was saying.

The moment they entered their rented room, they both landed face first on the mattress fully dressed and didn't move until the morning.

* * *

He wasn't sure if Ino had been the one to rope Sakura into helping her with the flu victims, or if it had been Sakura doing the roping, but he found he didn't much care. He had his window where she'd be preoccupied for the whole day, thinking he was scouting for possibly locations they could go to help out when she was done with Juugo.

He left the moment she kissed his cheek at the clinic door and didn't stop until he reached his tracks from two nights before. After catching his breath and eating a leftover tomato from the night before that Sakura had made sure to wrap up and save for him, he followed the tracks to the stream, and then along it.

Like a bolt of lightning the chakra hit his well-tuned and scanning senses, and he leapt over the stream in search for it.

He nearly lost his footing when his Sharingan picked up a human chakra signature, just above the root. Curious, but with his guard up he slowed and walked at a civilian pace into the small clearing above the swirling chakra.

An elderly woman was bowing in front a shrine at the farther side of the clearing. Her hair and clothes looked unkempt with a healthy coating of dirt covering her entire body, and a stray leaf stuck in her hair and grey kimono here and there. When he got closer, he saw that there was a sculpted rabbit's head on the top of the little shrine, and a chill ran up his spine. 'A rabbit? It has to be a coincidence, right?'

The woman remained kneeling and facing away from him, but addressed him in a surprisingly clear voice. "Who comes to see the Mother?"

He stops walking about ten feet behind her, his knuckles white on his Kusinagi. "I was just passing by," is his decided answer.

The woman shifts on her knees but doesn't look at him. "Passerby's don't usually stop to talk to an old woman such as myself."

Sasuke sighs internally at having more annoying women to deal with. He really wants to wait for this woman to leave and then come back to destroy the fragment, but the way she's praying at a type of shrine he's never seen before, with a rabbit's head no less, means he's going to have to get answers from her whether or not either of them like it.

"I was curious about why there'd be an old woman alone in the middle of the woods."

The old woman gives him a half crazed chuckle and swivels on her knees to face him. "Curiosity killed the cat, young one!" She gives him a toothless grin before opening her eyes and nearly choking on the breath she was taking. The click of change in her head is almost audible. "You have it! How do you have what is not yours to use? You must give it to me!" she screams while lunging at him.

He quickly dodges and curses himself, he didn't think to cover his Rinnegan, but most people are just scared by it. How does she know what it is? She seems to know at least.

The old woman is hysterically laughing and asking incredulous questions he doesn't understand. "That eye! It belongs to the Fathers! The Killers! Are you them? Have you come? Is it time?"

He dodges another attack, her toothless grin snapping as if to bite him, her eyes wild and untamed. "What are you barking about? Are you crazy?" he shouts at the woman, but she doesn't seem to notice.

She scrambles back over to the shrine and shoves her face into the dirt in a deep bow.

"Who are you? What the hell is going on here?!" Sasuke's patience is all used up at this point, instead of giving him answers she's only confusing him beyond belief.

With another laughing fit, she throws her head up in the air and turns to face him. "The harbingers of destruction are upon us finally. FINALLY! We've waited, looking up at the sky as the Mother did! FINALLY! FINALLY! They've come for the harvest, the harvest is upon us!" With a glance back at the shrine she adds, "Mother can you see? They did not forget you! They have come!"

His sword long since drawn and held in front of him, he finds himself frozen in shock and utter confusion, unable to follow the ravings of the madwoman.

She turns a terrifying look back to Sasuke. He feels as if he's staring into the face of madness itself, and yet it's familiar. This woman is human, for that he has no doubts and based on her movements and chakra levels she isn't a shinobi, but her that look in her eyes is utterly familiar.

It's just like Kaguya. It's the look she had in the visions Hagaromo showed him, the look she had when she told him and Naruto that they reminded her of her sons.

It's the same form of madness that had consumed her, and Sasuke has never been more terrified by a harmless person in his life.

After several moments of silently staring into each other's eyes, the look fades from her face and she's calm. Her face displays almost a serene emotion, as if the madness had burnt out and he thinks for one incredibly short moment that maybe she's come back to reality and he can finally get some answers as to what she's been raving about.

And then she's already lunged at him, and pierced herself through the heart on his drawn sword.

The serene look doesn't leave her face as blood seeps out of her mouth, and she reach a single hand up to pet his face just over the Rinnegan. Sasuke has never felt more like a terrified and confused child who knows nothing of what's really happening in the world in his entire life.

"Why?" is all he can ask.

"There's a storm brewing, boy. If you're patient, you may just get to see the show." She coughs up some more blood and he falls to his knees, catching the dying woman and looking at her with absolute questioning on his face. "With that," she points up to the side of his face where his Rinnegan resides, "you can see for yourself. You can go to the worlds of the harbingers themselves. You're lucky, boy; they're finally on their way. "

She has maybe a handful of moments left now, and Sasuke racks his brain for something, anything to ask that might make some sense of this strange course of events.

Then it hits him. "You said they're coming to harvest? Who are they? What are they harvesting?" he speaks with a shaky voice, is he crying? He doesn't know as he shakes the woman to keep her conscious.

"The Fathers…" Another wet cough. "To harvest…" A shaky breath. "Us," and with that the old woman chokes on her last breath, a sickening smile on her face.

Sasuke sits there beside the crazed woman for some hours, digesting what she could have meant in any of her words. She could have just been crazy, but something is pulling in his gut and telling him that it's not that simple.

As he watches her body and the ground beneath it burn up with black flames, he's never been more thankful to himself for hiding this from Sakura.

He has no idea how he'd even begin to explain it.

* * *

**Confusing! I know! Trust me I have a plan, and it's intentional to leave you all as confused as our poor dear Sasuke-kun! It's going somewhere I promise, and I'll keep touching on this in the years to come (in this story, don't know if I'll spend years writing this xD) so don't worry! It's not gonna go from 0 to Holy fucking CRAZY.**


	13. Sasuke doesn't want to be a grown up

Sasuke was the best he knew at hiding what was going on in his head; that is, other than his brother but he'd long ago decided after finding the out the truth that he'd never want to be that good at hiding himself. He'd gotten pretty close to that level of perfection once, and found it required the highest form of self-control, the kind of hiding that was even from one's self and he quickly decided he wanted nothing to do with that form of self-denial.

But even if he was the best actor left living, he still found that Sakura god damned Haruno saw right through him. It wasn't obvious—her knowing, it was rather the same barely perceivable change she no doubt witnessed in him. She had only asked him what was wrong once, when he walked out of the shower back at the border camp and she couldn't find his clothes anywhere—he'd burned them to hide that blood from even himself (that much he allowed)—and he had simply given a short non-answer before preparing dinner for the two of them.

Now though, as they crossed into the last hour of their journey back to the hideout, four days after he'd witnessed the confusing and life altering death of the nameless woman in the woods, she'll simply cast worried glances every time she thinks he wasn't paying attention. He knows he should just make an excuse for her as to why he's more distant, she's no doubt freaking out in her head, but he can't seem to think about anything other than that woman and what she might have meant.

He's brought out of his thoughts when he hears a thud and notices that Sakura is no longer beside him. He looks behind him, Sharingan activated and sword in hand, and sees she's slipped and is currently dusting off the front of the red travel cloak that Ino had just bought for her a few days before. He walks up to her, realizing just now that they haven't rested all day, and she's been pushing herself waiting for him to stop. The screaming in his muscles makes itself known now that his six hour long thought train has been interrupted.

"You okay?" he asks when he's only a few feet away.

"Y-yeah, sorry. We're almost there, I'm fine," she mumbles to him trying to get up, but he's already sat beside her in the middle of the road. The tree canopy is thick where they are, only for the next kilometer or so, so the shade serves to cool them as they rest. But he notices a slight pinking of her cheeks as she remains panting and frowns.

Two days ago, right before they left, he walked in on Ino giving her a shot and at the time he thought nothing about it, but now a slight pang of panic and guilt is pulling at his chest. Maybe she's sick and thought he'd get mad if she told him? It's not too unbelievable. She's obviously too nervous around him still to even ask for a break when he's too lost in thought to notice that they both need one. Concerned, he puts his only hand over her forehead, and frowns deeper when he notices the slight feverish temperature. She blushes at him and diverts her eyes in a way that makes him melt.

"You shouldn't push yourself so hard," he tells her, pulling his hand away to grab a water container.

After taking a sip he hands it to her and she gulps nearly down the whole thing before muttering dryly, "I'm fine."

"Hn." He studies her closer and notices the dark circles under her eyes that shouldn't be there, as far as he knows, she's been sleeping just fine. "You're sick, aren't you?"

She seems to startle at the question and looks at him with wide eyes. He feels overwhelming self-hatred that she seems so shocked that he'd be worried about her. She brushes it off by waving her hand and tells him through pants she can't seem to suppress, "What? No, what would give you that idea?"

"Sakura," he warns, "You're obviously exhausted."

"Tired doesn't mean I'm sick Sasuke-kun. I'm the medic here, remember?"

"Hn." He's not satisfied however, so he decides to ask what he previously had decided to leave alone. "Then why'd you need that shot?" He knows it couldn't be a vaccination, they'd both had theirs together not four months ago before they left Konoha.

She blushes deeper and looks away taking another innocent sip of the water before whispering, "It was nothing, Sasuke-kun."

He sighs; must it be like pulling teeth just to make sure she's not going to keel over on him? He's already thinking of carrying her the rest of the way to the hide out; but now horrifying thoughts of some strange and life threatening illness she's hiding from him are coursing through his mind and he can hardly breathe.

"Sakura," he says her name in the way he knows makes her do anything he wants.

She sighs and shrinks further into herself. If she's sick what's there to be so damn embarrassed about? "It was a birth control shot," she mutters as she stands up and stretches.

If he were a more open man, he'd fall over laughing. But he's not so he just chuckles as he gets up and pokes her seal. 'What a ridiculous woman,' he thinks with nothing but affection.

"You have no problems doing unspeakable things to and with me whenever you feel like, but a birth control shot is what it takes to embarrass you?" he asks with humor thick in his voice.

She punches his arm just hard enough to hurt and shrieks at him, "Sasuke-kun it's not that funny!"

He smirks at her as they continue down the path. "It is too."

"Is not, you big meany!"

"Annoying," he decides and receives another half-painful punch to his stump.

A thought occurs to him after they've been walking in silence for about five minutes. "So birth control, then?" he ponders out loud. He hadn't thought about it the whole time they've been having sex, which he now realizes is kind of stupid on his part.

"Well yeah, Sasuke-kun," she replies before adding with a sudden scorn to her voice, "Sorry if that bothers you." After a pause, but not long enough for him to reply she decides, "Well no, actually. No I'm not."

His eyebrows shoot up as she crosses her arms and he swears she stomps one foot harder on the ground between steps. "Why would that bother me?" he wonders. Now he feels as if he's done something wrong and has no idea why. Could he just have one confusing encounter with a woman a week, is that too much to ask?

She seems to think it over, studying his obviously confused face as they keep walking. "You're okay with it?" she asks him in a way he's come to recognize as a test.

"Yes." Again he reiterates, "Why would it bother me?" One of the goals from his childhood was to restore his clan, but that still seems like a far off goal. He's not even done atoning for his sins, having children seems stupid to him at this point. And he's not even sure if he wants that anymore, after seeing the Uchiha curse of hatred first hand. Continuing that line of hate might be too much of a risk.

"That's not why we're…?" she trails off like she was asking herself and he stops dead in his tracks.

"Sakura," he says in a warning tone when she stops and turns to face him. "What is this about?"

She seems to shrink into herself before gulping and squaring her shoulders, obviously relying on her courage to continue in this line of the conversation. "Shisou and Ino and me and… Well anyway," she bites her lip before meeting his burning gaze, "We thought that's why we're whatever we are. Babies, that is." Her confidence leaves with the last three words and she looks down and to the side.

Sasuke could scream he's so irritated at the stupidity of the pinkette and her friends, even if a small voice in the back of his head is telling him they have every reason to wonder about that. He steels himself before he responds, but quickly realizes any argument he can think of will either not work or start just that—an argument. He's far too mentally exhausted for this, so he simply walks up to her and grabs her chin with force to meet his eyes. He pours as much affection mixed with irritation as he can muster into his eyes before crashing his mouth down to meet hers.

The kiss is meant to be a message, so he puts ever skill he's acquired in the past four months into it. He moves his lips against hers in a slow, deliberate manner before forcing his tongue in, alternating between sweet and hungry actions. Their tongues dance together for a moment before he withdraws his to suck and bite at her bottom lip. Though the kiss is hot and normally would serve his purpose, he's not satisfied with it for some reason, and not even in a sexual manner, though the yearning to take her right there in the woods _is_ becoming appealing.

He pulls away and rest his forehead on hers to look at her breathless and blushing face, so obviously satisfied by the kiss, if not a little wanton. But he decides it's not right, it's not enough. He notices her mouth moving in preparation to speak, and he quickly moves his hand up to cup her chin and places his thumb over her mouth to silence the confession he knows she's about to make.

After a long moment of intense eye contact, he's decided, and he closes his eyes and licks his lips before taking a deep breath to solidify his resolve. He needs to make her understand once and for all, what she is to him. As much as this will mean to her, he finds himself wanting to savor in the words too, knowing the absolute truth in them. When he opens his eyes he sees the question in hers and smiles a real smile at her that nearly breaks his face, and he hopes it doesn't look to weird up there. He finds himself smug at her approving look.

"I love you, Sakura," he whispers as soft as the wind tugging at their hair before releasing her and stepping around her frozen body with a smirk.

When she catches up to him a moment later, he laces their fingers together and asks in a wayward way, effectively ignoring the confession he's just made in so many words for the first time since their first night together, "Do you want to stay on it forever?"

She stumbles a bit, and he squeezes her hand not looking away from the path in front of them, keeping his face blank again.

"N-no. I mean, I want a family one day," she tells him before adding, "If I can."

He slides a glance at her, telling her with his eyes to explain. "It might not be possible. Shisou's never had any kids, and her grandmother had hers before she got her seal. We're not sure if it's possible for someone with it to conceive," she says a little sadly.

"Then why make such a big deal of it?"

She blushes and he understands. "Another test, then?" he states more than asks, to which she nods.

The trees have ended now, and the hideout is in sight when he adds without really knowing why, "You don't have to take the shots anymore if you don't want to. It might not be possible after all."

The look she gives him could make him laugh. And he realizes a little of why he said that when they reach the door a few minutes later. "If it happens, it happens. I'm done planning every second of my life. My only plans now for are redemption." And with one final kiss before entering the hideout and no doubt being bombarded with a loud red-head, he adds in a sultry way he's learned to use, "And for you, of course."

* * *

Six weeks pass and both Sasuke and Sakura have become frustrated more than they'd ever thought possible. The first two weeks after their return had been hopeful for the raven haired young man, getting key words to look for from the crazy woman back in the woods had meant he was finally able to make some head way in looking in the old texts, and he finally felt like he was getting somewhere. He was far from completing the puzzle laid out before him, but at least now he could see its shape.

And then he reached a dead end along with the end of the mountain of texts. All the information he'd been able to gather boiled down to one simple but not very enlightening fact: there was some cult that believed the end of the world was coming with a "harvest." Informative, right?

Sakura was much more open in her frustrations however, always grumbling about how she was "Almost there!" and that she "Almost had the perfect solution!" but every time she got close to the right combinations of drugs, Juugo's body seemed to acclimate to them and render them null and void.

Karin and Juugo were becoming frustrated as well with the slow progress they were making, but surprisingly to Sasuke, didn't mention once giving up. At first he attributed this to fear of Sakura's temper, but realized last week when Sakura had passed out in her lab chair and Karin turned his offer of a meal down, that Sakura had rallied her to her cause to the point of dedication.

Juugo on the other hand, would take whatever foul tasting and smelling concoction Sakura would give him without a single thought as to what it might do to him. At first, Sasuke thought nothing of it until Karin had mentioned how much Orochimaru and Kabuto used to bitch about experimenting on him; he'd never go along with their medical testing too willingly. He seemed to just completely trust Sakura with his entire existence, and Sakura was the only one besides Sasuke who could calm him down when his temper got under control.

All that being said, even without finding the ever elusive end-all cure for Juugo, Sakura had already helped him exponentially by just being herself. Having that atrocious temper of her own, she was able to teach Juugo breathing techniques and calming hobbies that he used when he was by himself, or when he was gathering supplies in a nearby village.

He cried the first time he came back by himself from a three day trip without fully losing control once. It wasn't a full solution, but it was progress. Sakura simply smiled a beautiful smile at him and handed him a new concoction to try before Karin went about pissing him off on purpose.

Which brought him to tonight, sitting with an empty bottle of sake in the text room, reading over the three scrolls he'd found with any pertinent information for the thousandth time, and pulling his hair out. He faintly hears Karin's weekly ritual of screaming at Juugo and new to expect the ground to start shaking soon.

He sighs as the yelling continues and decides to go see if the girls need any help, before he and Sakura go about packing for the annoying blonde's wedding in a few days.

That's when he hears the loud and unmistakable scream of his lover and flash stepps to the lab in a matter of seconds, only to be greeted with the sight of her jumping up and down with Karin.

"What's going on?" he asks Juugo as the girls keep screaming and jumping up and down happily.

"She couldn't make me change," he responds before Sasuke sees his arm transform in a familiar way as the curse of his family creeps over his skin. "But I still can, Sasuke-sama. I'm in control."

Sasuke raises his eyebrows and clamps his hand down on the orange-haired man's shoulder as he changes back to normal.

She's done it. Looking over at Sakura, who's hugging Karin now, he realizes with some sort of pride for both of his former teammates (who he'd brought together no doubt), that they'd both done it and couldn't help but smile.

Sakura finally notices him and is on him in the next second, holding his chest with bruising force. "We did it, Sasuke-kun!" she says happily, looking up at him like a kid at Christmas.

He pats the top of her head and looks down at her adorable face with adoration. "Aa, you did well, Sakura," he whispers to her which earns him the sweetest most heartbreaking kiss he's had in his life.

No sooner had she started the kiss than she pulled away from him completely, clapping her hands together and declaring, "This calls for a celebration everyone!"

"Already on it, Pinky!" Karin responds, reappearing from the kitchen with several bottles and glasses. After pouring herself a glass, she puts on some music and they all toasted to the girls' success and Juugo's new freedom in life.

Sakura spends the first hour of their drinking and celebrating in the dim-lit lab talking to Juugo about the medicine's side-effects and how to contact her if there were any problems while they were in Konoha, which gave a very drunk Karin ample time to bother Sasuke.

"Sasuke-kun! So you're taking Pinky from us again, eh?" she asks him from the secluded corner of the lab that he was currently sitting in, watching the pinkette happily order Juugo around with a glass in her hand.

Part of him wonders if she was still trying to test whether or not he'd get pissed off, but the serene laughs he's hearing from the orange-haired man kept Sasuke complacent as he replied with a "Hn," and a raised eyebrow. Since when did Karin worry about him taking Sakura? Shouldn't she be angry that Sakura was taking him?

"She's too good for you, ya know," Karin added nonchalantly while she sat down beside him on the patched up couch.

He could have retorted with something snarky, but the alcohol Sakura was beginning to make a habbit for him dulled his attitude. "Yeah," was all he could say to that, it was the inescapable truth after all.

Taking another big sip from own her glass she, she muttered to him while shifting uncomfortably on the couch, "I'm not." When he raised her eyebrows in question, having lost the flow of the conversation, she reminded him softly, "I'm not too good for you."

"Karin," he warned, but there wasn't much stock to it.

"Yeah, yeah I know. Your chakra is delicious and all, but there's better out there," she slid him a smirk while adjusting her glasses.

"Really now?" he half joked and chuckled softly when Sakura started throwing office supplies at a surprisingly good humored Juugo on the other side of the room.

Karin hummed softly into her glass and turned to face him fully. "So, you guys are going to a wedding, eh?"

Without pulling his eyes from the comical scene in the front of the lab, "She is," was his reply.

He saw her blink from the corner of his eye. "You're not going with her?"

"Not to the wedding, no."

"Why not, Sasuke-kun?" Karin asked, adjusting her glasses to study his profile, like a scientist trying to decipher a difficult problem. It was really the only look he'd seen from either his pinkette or red-head in the last six weeks and he nearly laughed at it.

But he was the stoic last Uchiha, so he simply warned her from her prying with a "Karin."

"Sasuke-kun!" she exclaimed while slapping his stump playfully, "How many years have we known each other? Geez! I'm trying to understand your thought processes a little, Uchiha!"

After a long sigh, and realizing that Sakura was too busy to save him at the moment, he turned to face her. He did need to atone for sins to her right? Maybe accepting this request would count. "The bride's Sakura's best friend." Karin nodded for him to continue as she poured him another drink. "But one of her other best friend's wives hates me, to the point of possible war," he said simply, to which she spit some sake out and gave him an incredulous look. "Student of the Eight Tails," he explained. "And anyway, I don't like weddings."

Karin nodded to his first explanation but cocked her head to the second revelation. "Why not?"

"Don't see the point of them. Marriages yes, but not the parties."

"We're having a party right now, Sasuke-kun," she teased.

He slid her the famous Uchiha smirk. "There's four people here."

She laughed but conceded, "I guess you have a point." After a couple moments of silence, only interrupted with sipping noises she added, "Think you'll marry her?"

The question so easily fit into the conversation, but it still took him off guard. A small voice in the back of his mind had been muttering about that very question ever since their conversation in the woods last time they left the hideout for a length of time, but he'd been decidedly ignoring it. If he were to marry someone, he couldn't think of any other candidates, even when he was a child, but that still seemed like some far off ghost of dream.

It was definitely not something to be thinking of now. He still felt like even though he'd— they'd—been through so much, he was still far too young to be thinking of these things. Even that single conversation where he'd told Sakura that she didn't have to take her birth control shot (which was coming up any day now, if she hadn't already skipped it) was still serving to freak him out. And yet…

Mirroring the conclusion his thought were taking, Karin informed him while getting up to go dance with Sakura now that Juugo had fallen asleep on the other sofa, "All of her friends are moving on with their lives, and yet she'll be content to be in a nameless relationship with you forever travelling the world, Sasuke-kun."

He looked down somewhat ashamed and she added, flicking the side of his head before walking off, "Just 'cause I said you're not good enough for her, doesn't mean you can't try, you beautiful idiot."

* * *

It only takes another half an hour for Karin to need to be taken to sleep. Sakura helps him carry her to the bed, where she promptly face-plants with a giggled out version of "Good night."

Sakura and he stumble into their own bedroom and she jumps him in the next moment. Literally. Her legs wrap around his waist and her arms are secure on his neck as he walks over to the bed, trying to ignore the spider monkey of a woman attached to him.

"Sakura, we're supposed to be packing," he half groans out when she bites his pulse line.

"I don't caaaare," she slurs back just as he plops her onto the bed.

Though his body is loose with alcohol and screaming with a need to bury himself into the wanton pinkette before him, his mind is still reeling from what the damn red-head put there earlier. He needs time to clear his head and think rationally, and he knows the moment Sakura gets naked all clear thinking will go out the window.

Sakura crawls up to where he's standing by the bed, intently looking at the wall, and starts undoing his pants for him. So far not so good.

"Sakura," he warns with a little more conviction, even though his defenses are quickly slipping away along with his pants.

"Come on Sasuke-kuuun," she coos, "Drunk sex one last time, please?"

She's giving him puppy dog eyes and he thinks he's dying. Wait what was that she said? "Last time?" he questions aloud, his thought quickly becoming words on a loosened tongue.

"Mm, I'm giving up the sauce!" she chants as she pumps a fist in the air.

He gives her a look and puts his hand on her forehead, "Are you ill?" he asks, not believing that the mini-Tsunade would ever give up her favorite pass-time for anything.

"No, silly! Just in case, ya'know…" she eyes him with a lust filled gaze obviously not interested in talking anymore.

'Just in case what?' he thinks. 'Oh, right.' Well there goes his attempts at calming his mind, first the red-head tries to guilt him into marrying the pinkette in a roundabout way, now the pinkette is talking about possibly getting pregnant. She's even going to stop drinking. What is happening to his life?

When he set off with Sakura he had no expectations, but he certainly hadn't expected this.

He tries to calm his breathing but quickly loses control of it, panic setting in. He has to tense his muscles just to keep from running away from the annoying and confusing pinkette. He can't decide if she's ruining his life or making it better anymore. It's all happening to fast for him, even if everyone else thinks it's too slow.

He has no idea what to do.

Sensing his unwillingness to move, now that he was effectively frozen in place, Sakura takes it upon herself to free him of all of his clothing as well as her own in one foul swoop. He quickly finds himself on his back on the bed, still in a daze, trying to figure his life out in the most inopportune of times.

All thought stops however when he feels a warm wet mouth around him, and a tongue teasing at the most sensitive part of his manhood, quickly bringing it to life. He hears Sakura giggle at how fast he gets hard and he peeks down to see her red cheeks hollowing around him. Deciding that he has no choice in the matter, he simply lets her do as she will, and settles in to enjoy the feeling of her bobbing head, and the soft kisses her hair leaves when it falls on his thighs.

When she seems to have her fill of that, she crawls on top of him with all the seduction of the temptress that she is and slides onto him without hesitation. He curses at the tightness and opens his eyes to look up at her. What he sees through her eyes makes him lose his breath as his Sharingan spins to life to record this moment for the rest of his existence.

When she breaths "I love you," it's all over for him, and he spins them so he's buried between her legs.

"Say it again," he pants as he begins a brutal pace that leaves her screaming.

In between said screams, she smiles at him and mumbles against his lips "I love you."

It's as simple as that really.

As they move together, and her pink petals of hair bounce on the pillow in time with them, he knows what he's supposed to do.

When she kisses him to hold back a loud scream as she finds her climax with her hand snaked between them, he knows why he's supposed to do it.

A few moments later, when his head buries in her chest and he reaches out to euphoria within her, he knows he's come to this conclusion because it's what _he_ wants, not her.

And when she breathes another "I love you," against his hair as he settles in beside her, his face snuggles between her breasts to hear her heart beat, he knows that she wants it too.

He's going to marry this woman.

And soon.


	14. Back in Town

_Nearly three years ago:_

_Pain._

_The only thing he can feel is pain on a scale he's never known before. He tries to open his eyes, but the overwhelming weight that covers his entire body won't let him._

_'Am I dead?' The last thing he remembers was ending the infinite Tsuki no Me with the Dobe, and watching everyone slowly come out of the bindings from the divine tree._

_'No, that can't be right, Sakura saved us. Where am I?'_

_He hears a loud crash to his left, and the growls of an angry man, next comes the returned scream of a woman. 'Sakura?'_

_"He's still healing; you can't go in there, Shanaroo!" she screams. She sounds angry, but there's a hint of desperate pleading in it that he hasn't heard in a very long time. When's the last time he heard it?_

_"I don't care, girl! He doesn't need to be healed to be killed! Now get out of my way!" There's another crash._

_"You'll have to kill me too, Raikage, and I don't think that would go very well for you." she sounds calmer now._

_That's right, the last time he heard that tone in her screams they were trying to kill each other._

_Now she's trying to keep him alive?_

_The next yell is receding away from him. "We'll have his head, Haruno!" It's a woman's voice that utters it, the grumbles of the loud man seem to be leaving with her._

_He hears a click of the door opening, the quiet footsteps of someone approaching, and the soft cries trying to be held in. A cold hand comes down to his pulse, checking if he's still okay. 'I'm okay Sakura. Don't worry, you saved my body. Naruto saved my mind. Please don't cry for someone like me anymore.'_

_A tear falls onto his cheek. "They won't take you, Sasuke-kun. We won't let them." He hears another small click and warmth falls over him, lulling him back into unconsciousness._

_'Thank you Sakura, it hurt.'_

* * *

_The next thing he can remember, the pain is nearly gone. When he tries to open his eyes this time, he can. They burn for the newly found dim lit. When he can see, all there is a popcorn ceiling above him. It takes every ounce of energy in his body to move his head towards the breathing he hears._

_The pinkette is asleep in a chair to his left, a kunai gripped with white knuckles in her hand._

_"Sa-Sak..." he tries but his throat is far too dry and cracked._

_Nonetheless, green eyes above deep purple bruises shoot up at him. "Sasuke-kun! You're awake!"_

_She goes about checking his vitals, messing with his IV, checking his eyes. He only notices that she smells of sweat and blood, that her hair is matted unevenly, and that there's blood splattered here and there on her lab coat._

_"H...ow lo...ng?" he scratches out._

_"The war's been over for three weeks now, Sasuke-kun. It looks like your fever is finally gone." She's writing in a chart, back in her chair. The kunai is still in her hand. Does she think that he'll try something?_

_"The kunai..." He keeps his words short, for the pain in his throat._

_"Oh this? Well... The Raikage's been trying to get you," she laughs out nervously. "But don't worry_ he's _gone now, Shanaroo!" She smiles, but he doesn't like it. It's not the smile he wants to see. And the way she said he, is someone else threatening her?_

_Orange flashes in his mind, pulling with it his thoughts that seem to be floating along on a morphine cloud._

_"Dobe?"_

_"He's okay. He's been out of the hospital for 2 weeks now; he didn't have the same infection."_

_"Hn." Good, he thought he might be dead._

_The feeling is returning to his body, as the sedative wears off. He clenches his fists, only to look down and see only one move. Right. He lost an arm._

_Lost an arm like... 'Wait, the Raikage... He said they were going to kill me?' "Sakura, what happens..." He coughs a little, and she reaches up to wipe his mouth. "Now?_

_A serious glaze covers her face. "You have to leave when I'm done healing you. Not for good, you just have to make up for your crimes, a year they said. That's what the_ Kagedecided _." There's something he's missing, her tone is off. "It'll be okay. Just rest now."_

* * *

_The next time wakes up, it's from a dream of the last time he saw his brother in his reanimated form. The tears are hot and the salt stings the cuts left on his face. Before he can wipe them away, though, there a soft hand doing it for him, and he hears a soft lullaby, like the hand thinks he's crying in his sleep._

_He shoots his eyes open, and Sakura is standing above him with tears of her own. She doesn't look injured but there's the remnants of a stab wound and blood on the shoulder of her dirty dress, revealing creamy white skin that his pain-killer hazed mind forces him to linger on. She moves to leave him alone, now that he's awake and a strange thing happens to his body._

_He reaches for the hand that was on his face only moments ago and holds onto it for dear life._

_The utter confusion—no fear though, which calms his heart—is evident all over face, obviously not expecting this reaction. He's brought out of the moment by an onslaught of memories that should only assault him in his dreams, but have decided to feed on him now that he's conscious enough for them to make permanent damage._

_He deserves nothing less._

_The pinkette sits down and doesn't comment when he squeezes her hand too tight and starts thrashing on the bed, willing the memories away. He doesn't know what he's saying, but he knows it's enough explanation for her._

_He remembers the forehead pokes first. A sweet and happy memory, one of his only ones, tainted and twisted by his mind by so many years of hatred._

_Then he witnesses the end of everything he knows, by the one person he truly believed had loved him._

_His mind seems kind today, skipping quickly to the end as he tries to stop from breaking Sakura's hand. He sees Itachi, not scared by his madness, not blaming him after everything he's done in Itachi's own name, telling Sasuke that no matter what he will always love him._

_He loses his breath as Itachi's name strangles its way out of his lips. Sakura is on the bed, his head in her lap in the next moment holding him to stop the seizure he's having as his eyes roll back and he loses control of his body for what in one long and glorious moment he thinks might be the end of this life that has brought him so much pain._

_When the shaking stops, and she's about to release him, he stops her yet again and makes a decision he's not even sure that he himself makes. The memories, the pain, they're controlling his body at the moment._

_When he speaks_ he _can't even hear an ounce of emotion. When he recites off every tiny detail he'd learned of his brother, of the coup, of the massacre, Sakura doesn't freak out and run away like he expects her too._

_When he finishes with the last memory in the cave after his fight with Kabuto, she combs her free hand through his hair. Her first question takes him a moment to register._

" _That's… That's why you killed Danzou? Why you wanted to attack the village and the other elders?"_

_All he can do is nod. He hasn't spoken so much in a very long time, his throat is on fire, and he swallows on razor blades._

" _Is that still what you want?" she asks him without accusation and he thinks for one single second he sees a flash of hatred in her eyes that's not meant for him, as if she's offering revenge instead of trying to take it away as she has done for years._

_But he's tired, and his brother loved him and this village almost equally, and when he stared at the moon waiting to die, he made it a promise that if he could only see pink hair again, he'd do what Itachi wanted. So he shakes his head and she believes him._

_He finally releases her, wondering where she's going, and who she'll tell, when there's a loud crash outside his door again._

_There's a moment before it registers on Sakura's face as she smiles the most heart breaking smile, taking his burdens as Naruto once tried to, and succeeding where the blond had failed._

_Then she looks as if he's told her nothing, and Sakura runs out with a huff and the last thing he hears before the darkness takes him again sounds like, "What, you gonna stab me again Karui!? We won't heal you this time!"_

_He feels much lighter now and a voice he ignores tells him that Itachi would have liked Sakura._

' _Thank you, Sakura.'_

* * *

Present day:

The moment the gates come into view, he hesitates. It's only for half a moment, but it's enough for Sakura to stop behind him to give him a moment to get ready. The last time he had come back, before he left with Sakura, he'd been distracted by Naruto's letter and then by Sakura's chakra. He hadn't been paying attention to the hastening of his breath, or the beating of his heart.

This was still his home, and he still wanted to protect it. He'd spent last two and a half years running around helping the village from the outside, taking missions from Kakashi that didn't involve stepping foot inside the walls. But he still can't ignore the fact that a resounding hatred boils in his gut at the view of the city.

He has to force himself to remember that the councilors aren't here anymore (pink locks and blond pigtails conspiring together flashes in his mind at that reminder). He has to remember that even though most people are still frightened by him they all still know that he saved all of their lives twice, and that this was once again the village that his brother had loved.

He looks back to Sakura, who's busy fastening her headband back onto her hair for the first time since they left, looking shyly away from him; she was giving him a moment alone, even if they are only a few feet away from each other. With a deep breath, he walks back up to her and holds out his hand to give himself an anchor.

Sakura stares at the appendage in confusion, obviously not expecting him to want affection now that they were about to not be alone. The hesitation on her part leaves a guilty pang he's become very familiar with in his chest, only made worse when she speaks, "I can go alone, if you want. It's only gonna be a couple of days, Sasuke-kun."

He sighs and affixes her with a glare, he knows she doesn't doubt him, but he still feels insulted by it. He can do this. He's the last Uchiha, one of the heroes who saved the world, one of the second Sannin. He will not be stopped by fear, never again. With a determined huff of breath, he grabs the hand clutched over her chest in anxiety and drags her down the path towards the gate.

This is going to be fun for her. Why is she so nervous?

* * *

The village has grown so much, just since they've been gone that even Sakura stops to gape over the pale couple's shoulders when they're greeted at the gates. The buildings are all shiny and new, with more elegant lines and sleeker metals than any city either have ever been to.

They're both taken out of their awe when Ino pulls Sakura away from him with an exasperated sigh.

While the girls hug (a strange custom he's never used for greeting a soul in his life), Sai attempts at small talk. "I see you've returned Ugly unharmed. I take it your travels went well?" his pale replacement asks him with a smile that Sasuke knows to be fake.

"Aa."

"Was the weather good on the way here?"

He gives a small nod, eying Sakura to save him, but she's gushing with Ino while they're led through the village to Sakura's house.

"Will you be staying long?"

"No."

"Where all did you and Ugly go?"

"All over," is his short worded response to that.

"Have you been taking care of her?"

"Hn." 'Honestly, is this an interrogation or small talk? Does the idiot even know the difference?' he gawks in his head, giving nothing away.

After a beat of silence, Sai pulls out a book and fervently flips through the pages, when he finds what he's looking for, he makes a slight "o" with his mouth and puts it away.

He gives Sasuke a _look_ he's not sure that he likes before saying in all seriousness, "For males to bond, we must talk about our women."

Though unpleasant, it sounds true enough to Sasuke, from what he's learned over the years.

But nothing he's learned throughout his life could ever prepare him for what Sai says after that, with a determined nod. "After entering the coital stage in our relationship, Beautiful has become quite insatiable. Have you had a similar issue with Ugly, since the incident with Dickless?"

The attack is immediate, before Sasuke can register the anger brewing in him; both Sakura and Ino have punched Sai past him and into a nearby alley where he's landed on some garbage cans with a very confused look on his face.

"Sai, you idiot! What kind of question is that!?" Sakura screams while stalking towards the downed former Root-nin.

"It's not polite to share that kind of information, sweetie!" Ino says a moment later, with a sickly sweet tone to her voice that reminds him of a baby sitter he once had that told him not to eat the last tomato with strained patience. It's like she's teaching him that it's wrong instead of being mad about it.

Odd.

He stays in the road, somewhat frozen in place, trying to ignore the events that are taking place when he hears a loud and very unfamiliar laugh. He looks around for the sound, and when he reaches the three in the alley to his side they're all staring at him. Even Sai looks shocked.

'Oh right, I laugh now. Gotta watched that,' he thinks while on the outside he tries to save himself by muttering, "Tch, annoying," and looking determinedly away.

* * *

"Aaaaah! Home sweet home!" Sakura blurts while all of them are walking through her front door. Her and Ino immediately start removing the tarps, and setting the place up to look like a real house again, while Sai follows him to the kitchen to make tea.

After a glance at Sakura he stops, and decides on coffee instead. It is her favorite after all, even she takes an inhuman amount of sugar in it.

Sai clears his throat, leaning on the counter on the opposite side of the kitchen from where Sasuke is fussing with coffee maker, and Sasuke internally prepares himself not to laugh when the pale idiot undoubtedly says something stupid again.

"So, Traitor," he starts and Sasuke tries not to glare at him for the name, it's true after all. "I'm getting married."

There's a beat where Sasuke thinks he's either heard wrong, or he missed a bit of information. He looks back, and nope. That's all Sai wanted to tell him.

Suddenly talking to Sai's over-exuberant former fan girl of a fiance seems less exhausting, but he sighs and takes the bait. "Obviously. That's why we're here."

Sai nods like that bit of common knowledge is important. "But you're not coming to the wedding," he more states it than asks.

"Obviously," is his strained response when the coffee finally starts brewing, he feels a little bit of pride in his chest that he ignores. A couple years ago, making coffee would have taken him twice as long with one hand, and this time it was almost as fast as when he had two.

"Dickless is my best man, so it's customary he ask you, but I'm breaking tradition here," Sai continues and Sasuke only raises an eyebrow, leaning back on the counter and waiting for the coffee to be ready. "Would you come to my stag party tonight? Dickless and everyone will be far too loud and it would be," he pauses to find the right word. " _Easier_ if there was someone with my demeanor to calm them all down."

Sasuke blinks.

Wait, what? He quickly rewinds in his head, to double check he heard right. He's been asked to a stag party, no doubt with everyone who calls him a friend there, and it was _Sai's_ idea, not Naruto's? He focuses on the face in front of him, there's nothing but a shy smile there.

"Why?" is all he can ask.

"I've just told you, oh, OH!" Sai seems to realize why he's so confused. "Well, Traitor the thing is," he pauses to look over at the women, still happily dusting away in the living room before turning back to him. "I don't like you one little bit."

Sasuke snorts, about to add another "Obviously" to the mix when he's stopped by Sai's hand.

"But Ugly and Dickless, they're the closest thing to family I have. Ugly is like my big sister and mother all in one go. They taught me how to be normal again, like the man you see now." The determined look on his face as he gestures to himself stops Sasuke's sarcastic snort. "She is very important to me, even if I still don't understand it. But I think I love her."

"Then why are you—?" Sasuke doesn't realize he's interjected until another hands goes up to stop him.

"Even I know there are different kinds of love. Well… Now I do. Anyway, Traitor, you're important to my family and you seem to make Ugly happier than even Dickless gets when you're here. So, I've decided to give you a chance to change my mind."

This time he does snort. This idiot isn't on his list, he has no reason to do anything to change his mind at all.

Sai looks like he's about to glare, but stops himself, looking at the girls instead when he finishes his thought. "You don't have to do anything, you're already starting to."

This takes Sasuke off guard and Sai notices and decides with a nod to explain.

"I haven't seen her that happy, in a long…" he seems to think about the exact length of time, but comes up short when he says, "No, I've never seen her that happy. I'm sure on this. And that seems to be because of you, so will you come?"

"Hn," he grunts.

"Good, you can handle Dickless all night then," he says with a smile as he walks back to the women.

Though he knows the truth in the idiot's words, he still can't help but think he's just been tricked into babysitting.

* * *

Sakura was dodgy the moment they were alone in the house they'd given their virginities to each in, once again. He couldn't pinpoint where her inherent fear was coming from, but decided not to dwell on it, he knew that she had no idea as to his secret plans for himself while he was here, he'd barely began to formulate them.

She kisses him without looking him in the eye when she left for Ino's party and only half laughed when he told her that one night of drinking would be okay, but to make sure she could still wake up in the morning for the wedding.

And then he was alone.

He doesn't feel much need to dress up, though he has no idea what the plans for the evening are, he figures him just being there would be enough, as per the grooms earlier request. With a sigh, he remembers that this was a baby-sitting mission more than anything, so he straps his Kusinagi back onto his back.

There was a knock on the door, and he already knows it's Kakashi before he steps out of it into the cool summer twilight. Without a proper bone for greetings in either of their bodies the quiet conversation starts abruptly after several minutes of walking.

"Since when do Hokages go out drinking with their subordinates?" he starts off.

Kakashi raises his eyebrows and looks at him like he's stupid. "Since Tsunade did just that every night."

"Oh, right," he deadpans, the silence has always been comfortable with his former Sensei, but conversation has always been… Stale.

"Sakura pick that habit up?"

He sees the crinkled eyes of a smile when he gives a visible shiver. "You'd think two doctors would be more worried about liver damage."

Kakashi laughs, but ponders this. "You'd think so, yes. But it's better not to think too hard on the complications of women, Sasuke. You'll get nowhere."

Sasuke gives a small snort. "That's true enough." He finds himself smiling through an awkwardly forced conversation with the man he avoided at all costs unless he had something to teach him, his entire life.

He can tell by Kakashi's eyes that he's smiling too, probably making the same conclusion.

"Teeeeeeemeeeee! Kakakshi-senseeeeeeeeeeeei! You're laaaate!" a loud voice they could pick out of any crown bursts out from atop of Kakashi's head on the cliff side.

Sasuke just now notices that he's been lead to the base of the mountain, with the party they're to meet obviously on top. In a bout of absolute childishness he's come to associate with the white-haired Hokage, he hears him whisper, "Wanna race?"

Before Sasuke can blink, the man is running up the side of the cliff, his hands still nonchalantly in his pockets. Sasuke gives a more obvious smirk of his own and darts forward, sending just the right amount of chakra to his feet to propel them in a running pace up the mountain.

When he catches up to Kakashi, they share a _look_ and all the speed of hell breaks into their pace, as if there's a threat chasing them. They both lunge once they reach the top, legs still kicking in the air, and land right in the middle of lounging familiar faces.

"Shoooooow offs!" Naruto buggers to them, a bottle of alcohol that looks more empty than full, in his hand.

"Dickless," hiccup "stop talking," hiccup "like that," Sai manages out, his face is as dull as usual but his cheeks are red in telltale signs of intoxication.

"We're late enough that you're all drunk?" Kakashi asks, taking a bottle from the ground and turning around to drink.

"Would you all stop being so damn loud!" Shikamaru calls from his laying position on a rock nearby.

Choji just laughs and takes a swig from his own bottle with chips in his hands.

Sasuke is all at once hit with nostalgia. Other than the alcohol, he feels he's seen this exact scene a hundred times. He even finds himself wondering where the other men that would usually be here are.

"Everyone else is out on missions, they should be back tomorrow," Kakashi says, reading his thoughts and handing him a bottle he gratefully accepts.

Naruto staggers up to him, nearly tripping over Sai who's splayed out on the ground looking over the city. "Temmmeeee is Sakura-chaaan here?"

"Obviously, idiot. Stop talking like that." He very quickly has to hold the bottle in his mouth as he stops Naruto from falling over, and decides to put them both on the ground to avoid injury while Kakashi walks over to bother Shikamaru.

"Like whaaaaaat?"

He sighs. "Nevermind." Looking around at the nonchalant and very obviously drunk little group littered around the top of the cliff he states, "This isn't what I was expecting."

Naruto laughs at him. "What, rather go to a strip cluuuub?"

He takes a sip. "No, Dobe. Just not much of a stag party is it?"

"Beautiful said this is all I could I have," Sai peeps up from their left. "It's okay though, this is very fun," he states with a curt nod. "Even if it's not what the books say to do."

Sasuke nods back to him, raising his bottle when Sai raises his and taking another sip. By the looks of the empty bottles all around them, Kakashi and he really were late, but at least the Dobe is calm enough to not need much babysitting, even if he's annoying as hell right now.

When Sai half crawls over to speak to Kakashi and Shikamaru, Naruto whispers, a little more in his wits, to him, "Soooo, how's it goin' ya'know?"

"Hn."

"Ah come on Teeemmmeee give me something! You guys have been gone for a long time! What's new?"

Sasuke ponders speaking out loud the plan he's forming, but instead decides to gather information for it. Naruto would either find a way to ruin it, or go so crazy in excitement that Sasuke changes his mind entirely. "I'm guessing Tsunade will be at the wedding tomorrow?"

Naruto gives him a weird look he was expecting but answers, "No, without Sakura, Granny and Ino are running the clinic, so she'll be there ya'know."

"Hn."

"Why?"

"Just wondering," he lies.

"Tch, you're as constipated as usualy, teme!"

Sasuke's eye twitches at that, and he takes a bigger sip than he meant to. "And you're still annoying, Dobe!"

From behind them, they hear Kakashi mutter to Shikamaru and Sai, "So this is what it would have looked like if I gave them alcohol when they were genin. Not much of a change, really."

The whole group, save Shikamaru who keeps score from his perch, spends the rest of the night drinking and kicking the shit out of each other.

Now that's more like what he expected.

* * *

"Okay, I'm ready! How do I look?" Sakura asks him just before leaving again to go to the wedding. She's spent all day running in and out of the house, getting Ino ready and she's just now come back without a moment to spare to change herself.

She spins for him, and he can feel the blush on his cheeks when he _swears_ she shimmies just a bit too much when her back is facing him. The dress is lavender and makes her skin look more creamy and tanned, like coffee that's mostly milk. It hugs at her in just the right way, and shows off her breasts that look _nothing_ like he knows them to when she's naked, in this dress. Leave it to Ino to make Sakura look as appealing as he's ever seen her in his life at a wedding he won't be going to.

"Hn," he grunts but he doesn't let her face fall for long, when he pokes her seal and turns around, hiding his blush.

"Right, well stay in the house as much as you can. Karui's wedding is coming up, so there's a _lot_ of cloud shinobi in town." The way she says this might leave one to believe she hates the cloud, holding some scorn towards them as a village. But he knows better.

Most of the cloud have forgiven and forgotten, but Karui and her little group obviously have not, if Sakura's going away party was any indication. Sakura doesn't hate, it's not in her abilities (in his mind) but he knows she will fight tooth and nail with anyone she perceives as a threat to him.

"Okay," he lies and helps her out of the house with a light peck on her blushing cheek.

He only waits ten minutes before he leaves as well, not wanting his determination to wane. Even as he was preparing himself for this, he couldn't think on it too long without wanting to run away. He has to hurry before he changes his mind.

* * *

Sasuke finds the clinic easy enough, but chasing down the ever moving and obviously busy former Hokage is another thing entirely. Every nursing station just sends him to another one she left five minutes before.

He feels all of his resolve leaving his body a little more every time he misses her.

"Sasuke." He hears a voice he can just barely place calling from behind him, and when he turns, his hand goes immediately for the sword he hasn't brought.

Again.

"Oh relax, I was hoping to run into before you left again, can we talk?" the woman says, obviously tense. She messes with the straps of the identical dress Sakura had on, and he raises an eyebrow to her. Sakura looked much better in the dress.

"I thought you'd be at the wedding," he states.

"Yeah, well I was sent to find Shizune-san. She's late."

Sasuke nods, so they're basically going on the same witch hunt, awesome. He motions for her to follow him and is relieved when she keeps her distance at his side.

"I wanted to apologize for my behavior," she goes on, obviously _not_ wanting to apologize.

"You mean Choji wanted you to," he guesses.

She nods at him, relieved he won't make her say the words. But she still seems determined to come to some form of understanding. Her impatience and lack of tact that mirror his own when she states, "I hate you for what you did," almost make him laugh.

But he's the stoic last Uchiha so his only response is: "Hn."

"And I want revenge, but…" she trails off, awkward in her wording and at once he understands.

The woman hates people as much as he does, and holds a grudge just as bad, and for some reason he can't seem to place, he wants to help her. The stuck up look on her face is just like his own was years ago. He hurt her teacher and she wants revenge. He understands that more than he understands breathing. Itachi hurt his family, he got his revenge. The elders hurt Itachi, and he got that revenge too.

And it got him nothing at all but an empty soul and years of pain.

So he means it when he tells her, "I understand you."

She looks at him with now unkempt hatred and slams him into a wall of the empty hallway. He doesn't try to dodge it. "You understand nothing, Uchiha. Why do you keep even coming back? Just leave already, and I won't have to start a war to make you!"

"This is my village, not yours," he calmly points out, staring into her eyes without the Sharingan. He knows he could use it to make her see the past, make her realize his actions, but he doesn't.

One: This woman, other than reminding him very much of his younger self, matters not to him. She doesn't deserve to know his secrets.

Two: It would be a cop out, an excuse. He no longer let's himself rationalize his actions.

So he sighs and looks behind her, out the window to the hospital courtyard. "Revenge gets you nothing, I know that better than anyone. Someone tried to tell me once that all it would do was make everyone miserable, but I didn't listen to her either," he says to her, not looking back to her. He's relieved and confused when he feels the grip loosen a little bit.

"But… No! You don't get to say 'Oh yeah, hurting me won't make you happy, so you shouldn't do it,' you don't get to say that!" Karui bellows in his ear.

He turns his gaze to her. "I'm not."

"W-what?"

"Revenge…" he swallows on the word he's said too many times in his life. "Do you ever wondering why I agreed to capture the eight tails?"

"Because you were Akatsuki scum!" she grits out, hardening her grip again.

"I was. But before that, I wasn't."

She looks confused and he sighs. "I did that to get _my_ revenge. It blinded me to the world, all I saw was those who hurt me and nothing else. So I did things," he pauses when she seems to understand his line of thinking. "I hurt your teacher and…" he trails off. Suddenly he feels he needs to apologize. She's not on his list, but maybe she should be.

And not just because he hurt her, but because he infected her with his curse of hatred and revenge without even knowing it. He's pretty sure this woman wasn't like this before he came into her life. To her, he's the village elders. He's Itachi.

So he does the only thing that none of them would do for him.

He bows his head as she releases him and utters a half-breathed apology. "I'm sorry. You can hate me, but it won't affect me in the least. It will only eat away at you like it already is."

She stands there staring at him for a while, before he decides it's time to get up. He's never tried a formal apology like that before, for his redemption so a part of him thinks it won't work.

"That's why you're still out there isn't it?"

"Hn?"

"Raikage-sama was furious when you were only banished for a year, but it's been three. We thought maybe the Hokage made you stay away or something, that's why you took me so off guard back then. I never thought I'd have to see you again."

He blinks. "I wasn't aware I was banished in the first place."

She blinks back. "But then… Why _have_ you been gone this whole time?"

He looks out the window again, as she goes back to fiddling with her dress. "Like I said, I was blind before. When I finally woke up, I needed to see the world again with my new eyes." After a thought, he adds with the wisdom he wishes someone would have used on him, "You might find that you start to see things different too, if you let go of that hatred."

She looks like she's about to say something when they hear foot steps approaching.

"Karui! Oh no, I'm late aren't I!?" Shizune runs towards her, with just the woman he was looking for behind her, eyeing him suspiciously.

The two women hurry off to the wedding, with Karui giving him a nod beforehand and Tsuande beckons him to follow her.

"I was expecting you'd come to see me," she says smugly.

"Huh?"

When they reach her office, he shuts the door behind him, making sure it's latched properly.

"Well, yeah. Naruto got his arm nearly two years ago."

"That's not what I'm here for," he states, ignoring the proposition. He wants to keep his arm the way it is. He needs the reminder.

"Then, what—?" she's cut off when he pulls out a brochure he found at a travel agency while Sakura and he were asking for directions a months weeks ago.

She takes it and eyes the paper suspiciously. "A hot springs?"

"There are casinos too," he baits, pleased when a twinkle appears in her eye. So far so good.

"What's this about, Uchiha?"

He sighs and sits down across from her mountainous desk, steeling his resolve for the debacle to come. "I'm not one for crowds," he starts and she folds her arms to listen. "Or big shows of… Well I'm not like Naruto and Sakura."

Tsunade snorts and he ignores her, staring at determined spot above her head. "And I'd probably change my mind if I did this any other way."

She looks at him suspiciously again, but lets him continue. "Three weeks from now, Sakura and I will be in that town, I'll make sure of it."

"If I wanted to gamble with my student and go to a hot springs, I could do it while she's here," she states but it's more of a question.

He sighs, pulling his fingers through his hair as he continues on as if she hasn't spoken. "Come alone, and don't tell anyone. They'll make a fuss and half the village will follow. Sakura trusts and loves you, and as a former Hokage, I'm sure you have the authority."

"Uchiha what's—"

"Marry us. If she says no when we get there, you two can just go drink or something, but if she says yes when he get to that town—three weeks from today," he reiterates, "I want you to marry us."

She gapes at him, before going in the line of question he was expecting. "We could do it now, or you could plan a wedding and come back in three weeks, there's lots of ways to—"

"No. I've gone over it a thousand times. This is the only way I will be able to go through with it."

She looks proud for a moment, like his in himself. He may have changed, but he wouldn't even be able to speak if the Dobe was crying in the pews of a big church, and with how many friends Sakura has, the crowd alone would keep him from entering at all. He knows this about himself. This is the only way.

And then she has him by the throat and his back has demolished the desk. "Did you knock her up, Uchiha!? And now you're planning a secret wedding to push it under the rug!?"

When he can breathe, he strangles out a "No," that sounds very pained and she seems to be satisfied. When she straightens, she tsks at her broken desk and whispers something like "third desk this week" while she helps him up.

"So what's the hurry then?" she asks him once his breath is back to normal and she's sure he's not injured too badly.

"I see no reason not to be married to her," is his obvious reply.

She gives him a smile that reminds him of his mother and he has to look away from it.

"I'll be there," she tells him and he nods and turns to leave. "Oh and, Uchiha?" He peaks an eye over his shoulder. "You really are an idiot if you think that girl would ever say no to you."

* * *

**Woohoo! All done! :D I'm think maybe an interlude next, before Sasuke's version of a wedding? I'm not sure. I might end up being as impatient as you guys!**

**As to why I have the wedding set up kind of secretively: In Gaiden, not even Naruto or Shizune can answer questions about Sarada's early life, but they also can't answer questions about Sasuke's feelings for Sakura which leads me to believe they just showed up one day married with a baby. Buuuut I think Sasuke would at least want one person close to Sakura there, and why not it be someone who can marry them? :)**

**Sasuke would also probably run screaming from anything even slightly resembling a normal wedding, just for the noise and circumstance in my opinion :)**

**Please comment and let me know what you think!**

**And holy cow! Nearly 7,000 words! How did that happen?**


	15. A wonderful day for a wed--DAMMIT SAKURA

Sasuke had planned the upcoming slightly impromptu wedding for three weeks later for a very good reason. When he was at the stag party with the guys, he had managed to snag some important information for Kakashi before he passed out: All of the old texts that were in the Uchiha hideout he'd fought Itachi at were most likely still in the surviving building.

Since he knew the Uchiha were direct decedents of Kaguya, he figured they might have something, _anything_ about the cults he'd seen mentioned in the scrolls back at Karin's hideout.

So he and Sakura had quickly said their goodbyes, and he led them there. When they were close enough, in a town she recognized immediately—the town she didn't know he planned to marry her in—she started acting dodgy again. He didn't have another word for it. He knew she was just worried for him, but the way she fussed over him like an overprotective mother annoyed him to no end.

But still, a part of him understood why she continued no matter how many times he called her annoying. The closer they got to where Itachi had died, the more the nightmares happened, especially when he was waking.

One moment they'd be stopping for a drink of water, and he would be listening contentedly to her babbling, and the next moment he was doubled over in a pain that he knew wasn't real, with his brother dead beside him. It slowed their travelling considerably, for every time the memories would take him, most impossibly vivid for being ingrained into his mind by the Sharingan, it took her longer to bring him back. So she quickly began bothering him every step of the way, keeping him focused on her with a new thing to bicker about. Sometimes, when he would feel a memory coming, and began to stagger in his steps, or sit down abruptly to prepare to be assaulted by his own mind, she'd do something maddening, stupid or sometimes even dangerous. He'd be so focused on the annoying woman in front of him, both yelling their lungs out at each other, that the memory would be pushed away, his anger fighting it back.

And as the would-be two day journey stretched into a week for their constant stopping to argue or to pull him back to reality, he would wait until she was asleep beside him and he'd thank her, from the bottom of his shattered heart.

* * *

But now they were standing in front of the remnants of the mountainous building he and his brother destroyed, and no amount of annoying bickering could protect him. Seeing the building now, he had the urge to either go up to the rubble, to where he'd last seen Itachi's true face, and say to hell to this entire trip, to forget the other structure that held possibly world-saving information within it; the other part of him, the part he had to lock his muscles against, was screaming at him to leave, to run as far and as fast as he could and never return to this place where he last thought of his brother as a monster.

So he's frozen, teetering on the edges of a memory trying to pull him down, the memory of a forehead poke, the memory of a whisper on a smile. He's only slightly aware that Sakura is beside him, hand clutching tightly to his empty sleeve, arms ready to catch him when he falls.

When his knees give out, he's already in her arms, and he lets out a silent scream choked on tears. He awaits the pleasant numbness that will follow this, the empty feeling that eats at him but always brings him back to himself.

But it none of it comes.

He has no idea how long they've been here, staring at the building, all can feel is overwhelming sadness. There is no fighting urge to run or chidori the closest body. There is only sadness and a strange form of peace. He realizes when he finally turns his head a fraction of a movement to pear at Sakura, that she is crying and with his Sharingan, he can read the movements of her lips.

"…ank you, Itachi-niisan. Thank you for all you did for us all. Thank you for what you did for Sasuke. Thank you for keeping him safe. Thank you," her lips read. She's saying a silent prayer to his brother, revering him with the same overwhelming adoration that he does, and when she traces out the next unspoken words on her lips, the wind shifts in such a way that he believes maybe it wasn't all for nothing. "Rest in peace, Itachi."

All at once, he's calm and the tears stop, and though the pit in his stomach is still making itself known, he thinks maybe, just maybe he can get up now, carry on to the archives as he planned, find out if the world is danger and marry this woman.

When he pulls away to stand up, Sakura doesn't comment about what just happened, again. She never does. She'll just comfort him until he's okay then carry on like nothing happened, even though the look on her face in the moments of the aftermath tells him she wants to talk about it, she knows without him telling her that he needs to move forward and not dwell on it any more than he has to.

He thinks, as he reaches a hand out to help her up and steals sideways glances at her telltale uncomfortably awkward face, that this is why he loves Sakura.

When they reach the entrance to the still intact building, they're stopped by a sealed barrier, and he sighs when he remembers the formula to open it, it's starting to rain, the little pinpricks of ice on his face are welcoming in the heat of his still-yet-calm anxiety, but they'll get sick if they stay out here too long.

"Cut my hand," he tells her, the first words spoken aloud between them in hours, as the rain comes harder, turning her bright hair to a dull rose color he thinks he likes.

"Wh-what?" she seems startled by his voice in a way that reminds him much of the Dobe's wife when she saw her husband as children.

"For the seal." He gives a slight jerk of his head to the monstrous doors in front of them. "Uchiha blood," he states, his throat raw from the screams he held back earlier.

The look in her eye is something he can't place, but he doesn't have time to dwell on it as his hand is ripped open by an expert chakra scalpel. The moment he's touched the necessary blood to the door, and made the one-handed signs, there's green glowing chakra over his hand. Before the door can open, it's like the pain and blood were never even there and he utters words he's only ever spoken a few times to very few people.

"Thank you, Sakura."

She blushes and pushes on the old steadfast door when she sees he's having trouble. Coughing from decades of dust, they follow the winding corridors up inside the building, until they come to a cavernous room with candle chandeliers specifically designed for a fire jutsu only Uchiha know; he scoffs in his head at their arrogance.

Sakura's breath hitches beside him and it occurs to him she has no idea why they're here, that she simply thought he needed to see where Itachi died again, to help his mind recover. Which, don't get him wrong, was a certain part of this particular stop on their journey; he couldn't very well marry her if his mind was playing tricks on him in alternating intervals, could he? But he can slap himself for not thinking of an excuse for being held up in this library for the next week.

When he looks out of the corner of his eye however, Sakura looks no different from a child given a candy store all their own. The twinkle in her eye makes his breath hasten, as she looks to him, then the rows and rows of scrolls, then back again.

"I figured learning some Uchiha history might serve us both," he says smoothly but she only notices it as an assent to go mad.

At once, Sakura is squealing and hurrying down the first row of scrolls, and scanning over every delicate parchment with her finger in a way he would not be opposed to calling "cute." With a half hidden smile, he lights the chandeliers and puts his bags down.

Time to get to work.

* * *

They've been camped out in the library for a full seven days now, and he has yet to find anything in clan records or war records about the Otsotsuki. Soon, they'll have to leave for the wedding Sakura doesn't know will take place, and he hasn't found _anything._ Now he's not delusional in thinking that grasping at straws about a threat that may not even exist will be easy to research. But still, he's found nothing at all.

Every once in a while, Sakura will bring him out of his deliberate—though he attempts to look bored, as to not clue Sakura in—reading with a squeal and a "Did you know…?"

They're all little tidbits about Uchiha healing practices before they joined the Senju. Though it is fascinating in a slight way he doesn't care for, mostly because Uchiha were mostly unable to use healing jutsu like the Senju at all so the improvisation was impressive; so he finds himself listening intently only because of how she'll say things. She knows that he doesn't know a single bit of information she's about to spew, but the overwhelming desire _for_ him to know nearly pierces him in the heart.

He puts down the scroll in his hand with a faked sigh when he hears her gasp ever so slightly from across the giant table, ready for the new knowledge bomb he'll forget instantly.

"Sasuke-kun! Did you know there was an ancient form of poison only the Uchiha could use, that only worked on Uchiha?" she asks, her face alight before she dips it back down to the scroll and draws her brows together. "Or something like that, it's not really clear."

He raises a brow, that _is_ interesting. Peering down at the scroll he was reading to no avail, he decides he can allow a break to bask in the excitement that is Sakura Haruno for a moment.

"What does it say exactly then?" he prompts, pleased when she beams at him for his interest.

"Well it's all written like how they talked centuries ago I think, so it's a bit hard to follow." She bites her lip. "But basically it's saying that an ocular jutsu user and can use their chakra to make some kind of poison, and even if the person survives, their eyesight would be damaged. But the weird part…" she trails off, rereading a passage what looks like four times before looking at him confused as ever. "Were there ever two clans with the Sharingan?" she asks and he's taken aback immediately.

"No," he says with certainty.

"Hmm," she mumbles while biting her thumb. "Well it's saying it was used to keep the Uchiha weakened or something like that. Weird."

There's a _click_ in his brain and he has to stop himself from snatching the document from her hands immediately. "May I see that?" he asks with a carefully calculated air of boredom in his tone.

"Mhmm, I'll start dinner. We're out of tomatoes though," she teases him and he pokes her forehead before she gets up to go to the little lantern to boil some rice.

Unsure of where to start, or how many times he'll need to read this document, he quickly makes a copy of it in the banks of his memories, using the Sharingan, before he even registers the words before him. Just before Sakura calls him for dinner, his stomach sinks. This appears to be a report of war, not a medical text. It was most likely misfiled for the same reason that Sakura read it as a medical file without thinking on it. This isn't telling of a medical procedure or medicine or even poison of his clan. This is a report of a systematic extermination of the clan, from someone with very _very_ similar ocular jutsu to their own.

The only problem is that based on the date of the paper, which he can barely even handle without it crumbling, it was written at least two to three hundred years before the Hyuuga ever came into contact with them. So he's left with two possibilities:

Either Sakura stumbled upon the only document (he's already stored the rest of the war records in his brain the same way he did with this one) in all of the records from all of the wars the Uchiha clan fought in that even _mentioned_ a civil war within the clan.

Or this was an Otsotsuki interference no one ever knew about. This would make sense, because even as he rereads the document, without knowing what you're looking for, nothing in here stands out any more than any other other bit of medical information Sakura has given him, or any record he's read.

So maybe he's not crazy after all, going on this wild goose chase.

The joy at _finally_ finding something of value in his search is quickly out shadowed by the fact that the woman he met in the woods months ago was not entirely crazy. Something was coming, and the world, just now in a final and seemingly lasting peace, was completely and utterly unprepared.

And the only person who knew about it, to his knowledge, barely had a clue as to what was coming and was one of the least trusted people on the planet.

"Sasuke-kun?" Sakura's voice pulls him back and he realizes his very visibly shaking. She gives him a worried look but he knows she assumes it's just another memory taking hold of him, so she'll leave him be.

He can't peal his eyes from her however, as she quickly goes back to making dinner with a methodical kind of movement. 'Does any of this even matter?' he finds himself thinking and he'd like to tell himself he was referring to the threat looming over the world. Other than basic follow up on a war threat, and the Divine Tree fragments the both of them have found, she thinks this is still _just_ a journey of atonement.

He's never wanted to tell someone something so badly in his life, and not been able to. If she were to find out, he has no doubts she'd keep it to herself until they knew exactly what was going on, but still… She's suffered enough, hasn't she? He's destroyed her world enough times that destroying it now, even with a possible truth, seems like too much. He can't bring himself to do it again, even if a part of him knows she deserves his honesty.

Should he even marry her? Should their marriage, if there's one at all now, start while he's hiding such important information from her? He knows he's outwardly acting like he does when he's not in reality anymore, but he doesn't try to stop his body as anxiety and terror stumble through him with vigor. Maybe that's why he hasn't told her about the wedding he planned? Because even though he thought in the front of his mind that it would be a nice thing to do, surprise her again with his love, maybe the back of his mind was saying "You can always back out of it without her knowing now."

He doesn't notice when she walks over to him, like every other time she's most likely done this. But this time, he at least has some of his wits about him, even if the terror is just as palpable, he's still in control of his thoughts and body; so it's a shock when he finds his head between her breasts and fingers combing through his hair. She's humming a lullaby and he at once remembers it.

It's the same as the day he told her about Itachi. She's comforting him, bathing him in her love even, and she doesn't even think he's anything resembling conscious.

He leans into her touch and let's the lullaby soothe him, lets it drown out his screaming thoughts for just a moment, letting himself be just a man in the arms of the woman he loves.

The woman who has loved him since they were six years old and they met by the river while he was petting a stray cat.

The woman who deserves to wear the Uchiha crest more than he ever did.

So he pretends to come back to himself and she kisses the top of his head before smiling brilliantly and whispering in his ear, "Time for dinner Sasuke-kun!"

* * *

"I remember this town! I didn't know there was a hot springs though!" Sakura beams when they reach the border of the town just south of the Uchiha hideout they left the day before.

"Casinos too," he informs her and she gets a twinkle in her eye that scares him for a moment. Even plastered and destroying a table with her heal, she has never looked more like Tsunade.

He has everything planned, meticulous as ever, in his head. Tsunade should be here soon, and they'll get married at an old, half abandoned temple on the edge of town when the sun sets. He picked it, because he remembers stopping at the temple on his way to fight his brother and telling himself it was for luck, but letting his eyes linger on the Sakura trees that nearly threatened to overrun the ancient building.

As they make their way through town, he feels Tsunade's chakra far behind them and ushers Sakura into a Casino at once, having just passed it.

"Sasuke-kun! Why would you want me to gamble?" she inquires but her eyes are glued happily to the machine before her when he hands her the pellets he just purchased.

"You need a vacation," he tells her, perfectly rehearsed in his head.

He has several counter-arguments prepared if she should further protest, but she simply waves her hand and says, "I guess I do!"

"I'll go find us a hotel," he whispers in her ear, pleased with how red it turns before adding, also perfectly rehearsed in his head, "With a nice big tub."

Before she can turn to either follow him, or scold him for his forwardness, he flash-steps out of sight, letting a chuckle escape his lips as he follow the chakra he's known since he was a genin. He's relieved beyond belief when he finds her alone.

"Tsunade," he greets with a blank face.

"Uchiha. Where's Sakura?"

He can't help but roll his eyes at this, as he tells her with a smirk, "Gambling."

She gives a knowing smile when he turns to walk in the direction of the temple. The silence is broken when she speaks up. "So how are we doing this exactly? I brought the paperwork and stuff, but there's usually more than three people at a wedding."

He keeps his pace and can't help but look over his shoulder to see if Sakura is following them, when he's certain she's not he replies, "I'm taking you to a temple, I don't know how to set a wedding up, but I figured you might."

She snorts, "So I'm to do all the work?"

He nods, unabashed since he knows she'll comply for her beloved pupil. "Nothing fancy, it should be fine how it is. I'll bring ceremonial sake."

"Afraid I'll drink it?" she feigns being insulted.

He simply smirks when the temple comes into view and hears her boisterous laugh. He raises an eyebrow. "Could you be any more obviously symbolic?"

The temple is black, with a red roof and stairs and white columns on either side of the entrance, and the Sakura trees are even more overgrown than before. It's very close to resembling the Uchiwa covered with Sakura. He frowns and turns to her, the pink so plush it almost hurts his eyes. "Is it too much?"

She seems to appraise him, studying his frowning face for a long moment before she decides that she likes what she sees. She clamps a hand on his shoulder and squeezes reassuringly when he cringes away. "It's perfect," she assures him before turning to back to the temple. "Leave everything to me, okay? When are we doing this?"

"Sunset."

Her eyes widen and she looks at the sky, it's only about an hour until then. "Impatient?" He opens his mouth to speak but she waves her hand, "Yeah, yeah you see no reason to wait. Well! Go get her and the sake." She makes a double take back to him. "Lots of sake, kid. As payment," she decides.

He snorts, but nods and leaves her to do whatever it is that you have to do for weddings. He doubts it has anything to do with the legalities and documents that every Uchiha wedding—the only ones he's ever been to—was like.

He sighs and looks for a liquor store, this will be the first wedding he's ever attended with anything close to love being involved. A nervousness makes itself known in his stomach as he's greeted by a cashier.

He really hopes he'll do this right.

* * *

"Take a walk with me," he instructs when he finds Sakura at a different casino, her outrageous winnings being blatantly flashed in his face.

The sun is painting the canvas of the sky pretty orange colors mixed with the color of her hair, and though she's wearing the nicest dress she brought it's still reminiscent of her mission gear, and he instructed her to wear it this morning, she looks like a goddess. It's as if the sky itself is trying to absorb her back into itself, she nearly blends in. He thinks with an open smile she can't see, that she has never looked more beautiful.

"So where are we going now?" she wonders.

"I need to talk to you, so we're going somewhere quiet," he tells her, carefully emotionless to hide his excitement. Uchihas don't _do_ excitement, especially about romance, but his heart won't listen as it hammers away.

She gives him a look he might call sad but continues to follow him. "Oh."

The silence becomes awkward, as the only things he has to say can't be said until he's on the steps of the shrine, with Tsunade waiting for his bride inside. And she won't say anything.

They come up to the temple, and she doesn't even look up from her feet. He sighs, maybe she's figured him out and is just as nervous as he is? Or maybe she's not feeling well? Should he ask her? Or wait until after the wedding?

They climb halfway up the red steps and he stops, Sakura bumps into his back, and he has to catch her with his arm to stop her from falling backwards. Spacey woman.

"Are you alright?" he asks her out of concern, though he doesn't mean to go off script. It's automatic to worry for her health now.

She doesn't look at him but nods. "Just get on with it. W-what did you want to talk about?"

Definitely nervous then, he decides. He clears his throat and goes over the proposal in his head before nodding to himself.

"Sakura, we've been travelling for a while now," he starts, nailing it so far. "We've been in a," he tries not to stumble on the foreign and slightly scary word, "relationship," he manages to keep most of the disgust out of voice, and mentally nods to himself (his version of a high five), "for a while now too." He takes a breath to continue, but is interrupted when her hand flies up to stop him.

"So that's it then?" Oh good she knows what he's doing, he doesn't have to say all those feeling words he'd practiced. He audibly sighs with relief, but she only looks angry when he finally meets her gaze and he has never been more confused by her temper. "I know I've been annoying lately, but I never expected—how could you even…!" she seems at a loss for words.

He's missing something here.

"Sakura," he tries but she's visibly seething now.

"No, you want me to leave? You want this to be over? Fine! You didn't have to butter me for it though! Dammit, you… you!"

Wait, what? He's exasperated. She thinks he's leaving her? Dear god, this is bad. Back track back track! Did he plan for this? He's scanning his brain for something, anything to save this moment when she turns to stalk away. "Sakura, _stop it!"_

She turns back and raises her fist at him. "No, so _SORRY_ for being so annoying Sasuke, Shanaroo! I was just trying to help, but you know what forget it! I knew—"

"You're being annoying _now,_ Sakura!" he yells back before he can stop himself and that's the moment her fist makes contact with the ground.

Sasuke Uchiha has nearly died several times in his life, but he has never felt closer to death than he does in this moment, with an angry pinkette shielding herself from the falling temple, all the while glaring daggers at him. Thinking fast, out of instinct really, he summons Susanoo and shields them both in the purple aura before they can be injured. 'Shit! Tsunade!' In the next moment, _just_ as the roof was caving in, he extends the demon's hand to grab the former Hokage out of the building. He notices her deceptively young face looks equal parts smug and equal parts angry.

When he's pulled them all to safety, in the shelter of the thicker parts of the Sakura forest, Sakura finally registers that they're not alone.

"Shishou?" she asks, bewildered, just as his Susanoo finally dissipates.

"Hey, kid. Wish I could say this is the worst wedding I've been too."

Sasuke actually, physically can't stop himself from placing his head in his hand.

"W-wedding?" Sakura asks, turning to him. "What is she talking about?"

It's Sasuke's turn to freak out now. "I was proposing to you, you annoying idiot!" he screams and she gives an embarrassed smile before mouthing and "oh." "Yeah! For the smartest woman I know," he ignores Tsunade's amused "Hey!" "You're being really fucking stupid right now!" he continues to scream.

She blushes and turns her entire upper body stiffly to Tsunade who nods. "Why were you proposing?" she asks and he thinks he may die from how horrible this perfect moment is going so far.

Why not make it worse? "Maybe because I love your annoying, stupid pink ass! I swear! I've never met a more annoying woman in my life! When you're smart, you know everything about me, usually the shit I don't want you to, and it pisses me off! Honestly, how can you know every little thing I'm thinking about everything most of the time!? And then when you're stupid, which is a _lot_ you think I hate you, or you believe me when I do or say something mean, when you're _supposed_ to know everything about me! And you never leave me alone and you test me and you make me be a better person when I just want to rip someone in half and every god damn person on this planet seems to love you and you always make me wake up at the ass-crack of dawn to meditate and you fuss over me like you're my mother and it's annoying! You're so goddamned annoying I can't even stand it! Fuck!"

His throat is raw now, and his breathing is coming in pants, but he doesn't care. He's just royally fucked any chances he'll every have at happiness, and failed miserably in his goal to make Sakura happy. He quickly ponders running himself through with his sword, at least then she'd have to heal him, and he'll get to touch her one last time before she undoubtedly leaves his stupid ass.

But somehow, _that_ of all the things he's said today, seems to be the right thing, because when he looks up, both her and Tsunade are doubled over in fits of loud, uncontrolled laughter.

"What the hell is so funny?" he rasps out, embarrassed that he's being laughed at.

"Yes," he thinks he hears between giggles. He hears it again when she straightens and wipes her eyes. "Yes, you big dote. I'll marry you."

Tsunade chimes in with a, "That's more what I was expecting from this wedding." When she can breathe that is.

He blinks at the women. "You'll marry me?" She nods and continues her giggling. "After all that?"

She walks up and pokes his nose, just as they hear yelling from the direction of the temple. "Yes, but first, let's leave the money I just won and get the hell out of here."

"The temple was empty, I don't think anyone saw us," Tsunade conspires.

"You're the former Hokage," Sasuke points out when Sakura dashes back to the temple for a moment.

"And when I became so, I was on the run from debts. Won't be the last time I make a break for it." She winks and the moment Sakura returns, the make a bee-line around the town, to enter at the side, as if they'd just arrived. It doesn't sit well with him how easy it was for both of them to come up with this plan.

* * *

Once they innocently paid for rooms and got new bottles of sake (Sakura broke the last two he had in his pack), they find a pristine patch of Sakura trees in a local park, that luckily is empty now that it's nighttime. There's a little pond between the trees and swans dance happily along the water surface, disrupting the image of the full moon.

Sakura pins a blossom to his vest, and puts one in her hair, and Tsunade ushers them to the pond's small shore.

"Right, well. I've never done this before, so bare with me kids," she starts and they both nod to her before turning back to each other. He was hoping the color on his cheeks wouldn't be invisible in the pale moonlight, but he can make out the blush on Sakura's face so he thinks himself unlucky.

They're all dirty, with torn clothes and fussed up hair, but he can't be too bothered by it. He didn't fall in love with her in a wedding gown or kimono. He fell in love with her in the Forest of Death, with bruises marring her face and her hair roughly cut, with tears all over her red dress. It only seems fitting to him that she resembles how she did then, only not hurt this time, and with an impossibly wide smile on her face as she holds his only hand in front of them.

"So, we're here today to marry you two, though I think we've established that." Sakura throws her free elbow at her teacher for the jest, but it doesn't make contact. "So Sasuke, do you take Sakura… Wait do you have vows?" she asks and he finally remembers his long forgotten plans for how this was supposed to go.

He says "Yes" at the same time Sakura says "No" and they both gape at him. He clears his throat and nods. "I'm not good at words, but I'll try," he starts. "And I'm not good at showing you how I feel," he's satisfied when the word comes out clear, no cringe added to it. "And we won't have a normal life like your friends, but I know you don't want me because I'm normal." Both women give a chuckle as he expected, giving him time to plan out the next part again, make sure he has it all right.

"I traveled a path once, that you couldn't follow."

_I'm travelling a path the rest of you can't follow._

"Revenge was my only reason for living at that time."

… _but in the end revenge has always been my reason for living._

"I put you through so much pain."

_You told me that day how painful a thing solitude could be, I understand that pain now._

"Without you, even when I had finally awoken from that darkness, I still felt all alone."

_If you were gone Sasuke-kun, it would be the same thing as be all alone._

"This is a new path, a new beginning for us both."

_The is a new beginning, each of us a has a new path lined before us._

He smirks now, and Sakura has to hold onto his hand to stop from falling from her tears. She looks at him questioningly, asking silently if he's thinking of that night nearly a decade ago too. He answers her by continuing the script in his head. "I'm so in love that it's annoying."

_I'm so in love with you, Sasuke-kun, that I can't even stand it!_

"I can't promise you much, but I promise to try my hardest to make you happy."

_If you would only stay with me, I promise every day would be a joy! I could give you happiness!_

"I promise I will not leave until you tell me to go."

_So stay here, with me. And if you can't then take me with you!_

"And I promise to keep those promises until the day that I die."

A tear falls on his hand, and he's not sure if it's his or Sakura's at that moment. Tsunade clears her throat, and they both give a start, forgetting entirely that she was even there. "Right, well… Sakura, do you wanna say anything?"

Sakura wipes the snot from her nose, and attempts to speak, only for a another sob to break free. Even in this moment, he's still glad only a few tears have slipped by his guard, the traitorous little drops, and he's not embarrassing himself more today.

"Okay, then how about…" Tsunade taps her finger on her chin thoughtfully. "Sakura, do you promise all that stuff too?" Sakura nods and he squeezes her hand. "And, for legal stuff I don't care about, do you want to marry Sasuke?"

This time Sakura finds her voice, and squeaks out a "Yes."

"Well then, by the power invested in me as the Fifth Hokage I declare this union legal and whole. I have no one to present you to though… So! Sasuke Uchiha, meet Sakura Uchiha. You may now kiss your bride while I get the sake."

It's immediate, their lips crash together with a force that would most likely knock a civilian unconscious, but neither of them care. Sakura tastes like tears and love, and the way she remains in a sobbing fit, nearly unable to kiss him back, seems fitting as well. She claws at his back, and his hands knot in her tangled hair and the world disappears for a moment. One by one the colors and noises from the clearing they're in fade, the swans, the moon, her teacher all disappear and there is only the two of them for one infinite moment. Sasuke kisses his _wife_ as he should have done the first night she told him she loved him, and it leaves them both without any breath or care in the world that slowly returns to their plain of existence.

He pulls away reluctantly, the moisture from her lips still heavy on his own, when Tsunade returns with two sake cups and a certificate to sign. When they've signed and taken their sips, Tsunade leaves mumbling about "getting your room ready for the honeymoon, so Uchiha won't fuck that up for her student too" and Sakura finally stops crying.

"I love you, Sasuke-kun," she whispers with the noise of the wind.

He leans his forehead on hers and smiles a real smile that's beginning to feel more natural every time he tries it. "Sakura Uchiha, _thank you for everything."_

* * *

**Another loooooong chapter! Finally done! I kinda cried a little bit when writing the wedding scene. I like writing how I think Sasuke would attempt sap, even if it's completely different from other pairing's fluff.**

**I promise! You'll get the wedding lemon next chapter, I want it to be perfect and special and all that, and I've been writing for hours straight and this is already 7,000 words. So patience is a virtue ;D**


	16. First Day of the Rest of Our Lives

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hey boys and girls! I totally meant to get this to you guys sooner, but then I had an ovarian cyst burst, and had to get another one drained, and I'm fine now, don't worry but I was in the hospital and couldn't write! D:
> 
> But I'm back now! And I just want to say THANK YOU to everyone who reviewed on the last chapter, I'm so thrilled! Keep them coming, and I'm always so shocked and happy to know how much you guys like this story!
> 
> Oh yeah, and the *words are translated below.
> 
> In Gaiden Sakura orginally calls Sasuke "Anata" which is kinda like Darling, but said from a wife to her husband.
> 
> And Sasuke will occasionally refer to her as "Tsuma" which is a name a husband will call him wife. Basically mean wife, but with a little adoration in there.
> 
> "Ryokan" is a traditional Japanese inn that started way back in the 1600 hundreds, and onsen is a hot springs, though the room they get is like super fancy and has a tub with pumped in hot spring water.
> 
> Okay, done with that... So without further ado... The wedding night, wink wink ;D

 

"Money, kids," Tsuande orders as they reach the ryokan*.

"I thought that bottle of sake was your payment?" Sasuke questions, getting very annoyed from being delayed in taking his _wife_ to their room.

"Yes, but now you plan on taking my student away for the night without celebrating, eh?" she teases.

He looks down at Sakura, she's blushing and staring at him like she has no idea what's going on around her. He mildly considers that if they're delayed any further he won't be able to stop her from jumping him in the middle of the lobby.

"So I'll go celebrate for you!"

"Isn't the custom to give the couple money on their wedding day?"

The smirk he receives lets him know this argument will not be won at any point. "Haven't you broken pretty much every custom today, Uchiha?"

"Hn." He really isn't worried about the money, he _is_ the sole inheritor to the entire Uchiha fortune after all and even after paying the five villages his fines for the crimes he committed, and he still has more money than he'd ever need. But hes running low on cash, and finding a bank that would serve the Uchiha accounts is annoying. Sighing, he relents though.

Tsunade takes the money with much more gusto than he likes and hugs a very unfocused Sakura before sauntering off. Annoying women.

Sakura stumbles slightly as he pulls her along to their room, Tsunade and he decided on the fanciest one in the town, while Sakura had looked for the place for their wedding. This ryokan luckily had a honeymoon sweet, with a private onsen* tub right off of it, just as he'd planned.

He's becoming slightly worried that she's not talking, only staring at him without a break the whole way to the room. Every time he looks out of the corner of his eye, he notices her visibly gulp as if she's nervous. They haven't made love in a couple of weeks, travelling and being in an old library next to where his brother died killed the mood for a while there, but it's not like they're new to this. But this day has been so confusing and annoying and wonderful, he finds he doesn't quite care if she's continuing her mood swings.

He reaches the door and slides it open when Sakura releases his only hand. It smells like green tea and Sakura blossoms, and has a variety of flower peddles littering the tatami, and Sakura's favorite apple sake on the table, along with a blue box with a big pink gaudy bow. Sasuke prepares himself to be pounced, but when he doesn't, he guides her to the low table, and sits beside her.

When she continues to act nervous, without speaking, he pours her some alcohol, a smile playing on his lips when she downs three glasses in quick succession before speaking.

"Did that really just happen?" she whispers for the first time since they left the clearing an hour ago.

"Aa."

"I'm your… We're married?"

"Yes, _Sakura_ ," he says this with the inflection he knows from experience drives her mad.

She stares at him for a few moments while he pours himself two glasses and drinks them to catch up with her, also nervous for some reason. Even though he had the time to plan this, it's all sinking in now. He's forever, irrevocably tied to his annoying old teammate.

"I've dreamt of this day since we were six," she admits, a little more confidant with her tone, the alcohol swiftly calming her nerves.

"I know."

"You really meant everything you said?" she asks, laying her hand halfway up his thigh.

"I did," he replies easier than he thought he'd be able to.

A beautiful smile comes across her face, and she teases him. "Everyone is gonna be so pissed that they weren't invited." Her face instantly falls and her head hits the table. "Oh gods, my parents!"

He's about to apologize, to explain why it could only be one person, even though he wishes it were just them, when she expertly figures out his reasoning. "But you wouldn't have been able to say all that in front of anyone else could you?"

He looks away, slightly ashamed that he's so incapable. "Yes."

She uses her other hand to turn his face to her's. "It was perfect, Anata*," she assures him. "I never need you to be anything you're not. I didn't expect any of the things you said." She softens her gaze and locks their eyes, tracing over his cheek bone with her thumb, leaving a reddened and warm trail in its wake. "Nobody else needs to know, nobody else needed to be there."

Sasuke places his hand over the one on his cheek and squeezes. He's about to make the inevitable move, when a thought occurs to him, a question he needs the answer to more than anything. "Are you happy, Sakura? Even if we can't be in the village with your friends and family, are you happy?"

She responds with an "Anata," and an immediate kiss to his parted lips.

Sasuke moves his hand to her hair and pulls her closer, tugging on it slightly, to move her lips from his own so he can pepper kisses down her pulse line. He's very pleased at the little moans he earns at such a small gesture.

"Let's take a bath, Tsuma*," he whispers in her ear, eliciting a pretty laugh from her as he helps her up.

It's a slow paced need to rid each other of their clothes. Their eyes stay locked, as they go about removing every article of clothing, only to wander when they're both naked. It's like seeing each other for the first time, no longer is it just blinded passion between two people linked in some way neither can describe. Now they're married, one entity entirely, one cannot be themselves with the other. Each are one half of a whole that makes up the now doubled in size Uchiha clan.

He lets his eyes wander down the lines of her neck, a pale grey color in the moonlight let in from the open roof of the onsen room connected to their suite. The subtle peaks of her collar bones jutting out to create a pleasant shadow over her breasts. They're not too small, though they're not big either. Her breasts are perky and soft and he knows that they fit perfectly in his hand. His eyes travel farther down to her delicate wrists and hands. They're hands that have brought him so much pleasure, hands that have almost killed him, and have completely saved his life. He smiles as he reaches her navel, behind it is where his child will live one day, a perfect replication of the two of them and their love. Without shame he licks his lips and lets his eyes linger on the pink curls over her sex, causing his own to harden slightly at the memory of its taste. Finally, he finishes his appraisal on her legs, muscular and feminine at the same time, stretching along for days, legs that wrap so nicely around him.

Slowly, no telling how long they've been staring at each other's bodies, they let their eyes meet again and Sakura smiles, teeth twinkling in the low moon light and turns to the shower station. While he's bathing himself, he notices how diligently she scrubs at herself, like he might think her unclean or something. Little does she know, he'd have his fill of her if both of them hadn't bathed in weeks, if she went rolling around in a mud pit, just as long as it was her that he was inside of.

When they're both cleaned properly, Sasuke helps her into the water, the sulfur and mineral smell a relaxing reminder of the water's comforts. She lets out a happy moan as the warmth takes over her body, and lays her head back on the side as he settles beside her.

Once they're both acclimated to the temperature, their eyes meet again and there's a celestial _shift._ She's on his lap in the next moment, water splashing along the side of the tub, and a little on their melded faces. Her sex is rubbing up against his length, commanding it to harden as their tongues dance together. He slides his hand between them, and slides his middle finger into her warmth without any hesitation. He feels himself twitch when she moans, and starts curling his finger and rocking in and out as both of her hands squeeze his face. When he adds a second, and uses the pad of his thumb on her sensitive from weeks without sex clit, and her head throws back, no longer being able to coordinate kissing. He takes this opportunity to bite harshly on her pulse in just the way she likes it, and as she cries out loudly he feels her walls flutter around his finger.

"Sasuke-kun!"

"You really like that don't you?" he chuckles out. To emphasize his point, he picks up the pace of his thumb on her sensitive button, and curls his fingers more. He knows she's about to find her pleasure, and he's contented to watch, but she's rolling her hips on his hand her breasts are bouncing so deliciously he can't help but take one in his mouth.

Just as he's satisfied with one little rosy pebble and moves on to the next one, she squeezes around his fingers and cries out a strangled version of his name. Her entire body shakes in a way that makes him curse only having one hand, for he wants nothing more than to hold her to him in this moment.

When she finally collapses onto him, he withdraws his hand and runs his fingers up her spine, leaving goose bumps despite the impossibly warm water. She comes back to reality and moves her hand to grasp his length, but he stops her. Instead, he grabs her hip and aligns their sexes. She sinks down impossibly slow, both of them reveling in the tightness of her post-orgasmic core. A light shudder runs through his body when he's fully enveloped inside of her, and he moves his hand up to cup her face, asking her to look at him.

She places her hands on his shoulders for leverage, and starts moving up and down in a lazy but meaningful rhythm. Their eyes are locked again, hers are two deep pools of emerald while he knows his are now red and a deep purple. He ingrains her every facial expression, every bit of love in her eyes as she moves on him; he wants to make sure he remember every moment of this night.

The pleasant friction becomes beyond incredible when she picks up the pace, reaching her hand down between them to no doubt flick at her sensitive button herself. He starts running his hand up and down her back, pressing hard to massage the muscles as he goes, and lets out low groans from the base of his throat in between her moans.

They may have no idea what it means to be married, she may have a temper bad enough to assume he's breaking up with her and destroy the temple they were to be married _in,_ and he may be so emotionally constipated that they had to have a secret wedding just for him to be able to tell her a modicum of what he feels, but like this, they know exactly what to do. When she's rocking on top of him like she is now, becoming more and more erratic with her pacing as more often than not her walls are fluttering, they don't need the words he can't find, and there's no room for anger or misunderstanding she can experience.

If there was ever a perfect act, a pure way to share something with someone, this would be it. For most of his life, he thought of sex as little more than a distraction, a needless form of gymnastics for release; and he would much prefer to relieve himself on his own. But with Sakura the pleasure is so intense, so mind numbing that he thinks it's closer to a drug than an act. With Sakura, the eye contact alone when she's _almost_ there, when he's almost lost to the feeling altogether, is more profound than any speech or declaration of love anyone has ever made.

He buries his face in the crook of her neck and bites down, holding her chest to his as she screams another wrangled rendition of his name, and he almost comes right there for the tightening around him. When he looks up at her, she's still riding out her bliss, eyes scrunched shut for the pleasure, and he thinks he's never made a better decision in his life than to make her his wife.

She lessons her pace when she's out of the wonderful world of orgasms, and he decides the water is too much for both of them, now that they're covered in more sweat than water, and red for the temperature and excursion. So he places his arm under her and whispers into her flushed ear, "Wrap your arms around me, _Tsuma."_

She quickly complies, rocking lazily into him with as much of a motion as his arm allows as he carries the out of the water and into the adjoining room. He made sure there was a modern, high up bed in this room, knowing Sakura prefers them, and looking at it now, he has an idea.

He places her down on the edge of it, still buried inside of her, and takes a moment to appraise her. Her eyes are half closed in post-orgasmic exhaustion, her chest is heaving, leaving her breasts to bounce happily on her chest, and her skin in the brighter light of the suite is a creamy pink color. She reaches up and rakes her nails down his chest, silently pleading with him to do _something._

He's on his knees, his thighs nearly touching the edge of the bed, and he pulls her closer, eliciting a cute yelp out of the pinkette at his quick jerk. At once, he snaps his hips forward before pulling out to the very tip and snapping back in to the hilt again, causing her to widen her legs, basically doing the splits in the air. He can reach so deep like this, he nearly loses himself, but this is the first night of the rest of their lives, so he challenges himself. Sasuke begins a brutal pace, both fast and hard, reaching all the way inside of the delicious heat that all but belongs to him now.

She starts crying out every time he thrusts his hips forward, and her core is leaking her essence down his thighs. The pleasure is almost too much as she begins to tighten even further around him; the only noise in the room is the wet slapping noise of flesh on flesh in time with Sakura's screams. He pushes her further, letting out his own hushed groans, as his thumb finds her very swollen bud and teases it in slow circles, a startling contrast from the brutal treatment of his hips.

He allows himself to watch her as if she were his own private show, writhing in front of him, hands clutching at her own breasts and the bed as if she can't seem to find a comfortable place to be. He picks up the pace of his thumb, to match pounding of his hips and he can feel his balls tightening, the coil in his belly is close to snapping but he holds back. Just one more time, he has to get her there one more time; he has to make this the most amazing moment of her life too.

"Sasuke-kun!" she careens and he grunts back, slamming his hips forward in a particularly hard thrust.

"Come, Sakura," he orders, his voice so low and thick it barely sounds like his own.

He feels her walls clamping down not quite so tight as to be an orgasm and then relaxing. "I—I can't… Ngnh! Sasuke-kun, please please!" she screams at him, begging for another release.

He bends down, changing the angle so he knows he's better hitting that place inside of her, but doesn't slow his pace. As he trails bites up her breast bone, under her collar bones, above them and her pulse line, her hands are suddenly everywhere. They knot in his hair, tugging when he does something she likes, clawing at his back when he changes the pattern of his thumb rubbing on her sensitive clit, digging into his ass to make him thrust harder. He has to use chakra, sending it to his core and leg muscles, to further quicken his pace.

When he finally reaches her mouth, she can't seem to focus well enough to kiss him, instead she bites his bottom lip in a way that might hurt if done at a different time, but only brings out a further animal need to consume her. He straightens back up, once more changing his angle within her, and focuses on her clit more intensely. They've all but dried from the onsen tub now, but his thighs are positively drenched, and his thumb is so wet he can barely keep it on the nub; she's the picture of wanton desire.

"Please, oh! Please, Sas...ke...kun ple...ase..." she begs in broken moans.

"Come, Tsuma. Nngh, come!" he grunts out the order, pleased with the extra loud moan it earns.

Finally, in one crashing moment, the stars seem to align and cascade onto her, as she clamps down on him tighter than the first time that they made love, and her scream is so loud he knows there's no way the whole building didn't hear her. But he doesn't care, as her essence is released all over his legs and hand, filling the room with her maddening scent. The tightness is delicious, and he finally moves his hand from her red bud to pull her up to sitting. He has to support her weight as she can barely keep herself up and he holds her. He's oddly comforted—though he barely registers it—when her arms wrap around his neck.

He pumps into to a few more times before the pleasure finally slams into him like a deadly punch, radiating out from his groin to the very tips of toes and the hair follicles on his head. It starts with a low groan, as he spills his seed in erratic bursts inside of her, and ends with something that sounds like "I love you," mixed with her name.

After a few perfect seconds, milking every last drop of pleasure, he collapses so he's sitting on his feet, effectively pulling out of her, and rests his forehead on her knee.

Through pants Sakura lets out a, "Wow."

He chuckles as his body throbs against her knee. He leaves light kisses everywhere he can reach without moving. "Yeah."

She laughs with him. "If that's what married sex is like, we should have gotten married a loooong time ago."

Sasuke looks up at her and smiles, before reaching up to tap her forehead. She cringes slightly at her liquids being all over his hand, and looks down to their soaked legs. "But… Now we need another bath," she jokes lightly, and when they can move, walks back to the bathing room.

"Tch, annoying."

* * *

Though they're both exhausted, neither of them can find it in them to end this night yet, so when they're clean again they sit at the low table on the tatami and decide to finish the apple sake Tsunade got for them.

This is when Sakura notices the gaudy and very obvious gift box on the other end of the table. She leans over to grab it, nearly make Sasuke hard again, as she's sitting in the middle of his crossed legs with only two thin layers of fabric from their robes between them. She leans back against his chest and he rests his chin on her shoulder as she examines the gift.

"Is it from you?" she asks, as she unties the bow in what he might describe as dainty manner. Though she'd probably hit him for calling a kunoichi like her dainty.

"No, Tsunade I guess."

"Hm," she ponders as she removes the lid of the long, rectangular box. The tissue paper is an expensive looking pink color, but it's still not as interesting or beautiful as her hair, so he closes his eyes and nuzzles his nose in her growing locks. She's probably due for a haircut, he muses, her hair is just now bellow her shoulders, the longest it's been since they were genin.

He's pulled out of his musings when her breath hitches, and he looks over shoulder, tightening his arm around her waist possessively. In what he now realizes is a garment box are two of her normal mission dresses, complete with two black obis, only these have Uchiwa embroidered in fine and durable silk on the back. Her fingers trace delicately over the symbol for the clan she joined today, and he notices a tear slip down her face.

He moves her so she's sitting beside him, and reaches in to inspect the contents with her; there are four more Uchiwa patches, all made of the same expensive and shinobi worthy silk as the ones on the new dresses.

"I think that's the first time I've seen it on such a bright color," he tells her, as he too traces over the symbol for the clan he lost, and just now realizes he's starting to finally rebuild.

She looks over at him, another tear slipping past her guard. "Should I where darker colors now?" she asks, no tone of accusation or hurt in her voice. If he were to tell her to change her entire wardrobe to match the Uchiha, he knows she'd comply without a second thought. That need to make him happy without a care for herself touches him, and annoys him to no end, but he can't say he blames her much anymore. He feels the same way about her happiness.

He smiles, a feeling he only ever gets with Sakura swelling in his chest. "If my father was alive, he would probably make you," he informs her with a lightness that almost causes him to pause. "But this won't be the Uchiha clan it used to be. It's already very different than it used to be," he realizes.

"What do you mean?" she asks, as she holds up one of the dresses to fully appraise it.

"Well, for one I would have probably been told to marry an Uchiha," he tells her which earns him a slightly shocked look. "It was how it always went, though I don't think I would have listened." He gives her a slight smile and she goes back to staring at the fan. He sighs and thinks it over before continuing, he's never really talked about the Uchiha customs before the massacre with anyone, but she's a part of the clan now so… "It was always about power with them. That was their downfall, really." Sakura looks over at him with sadness in her eyes, so he pokes her seal and settles back on his hand. "Marriages were alliances, so sometimes they would be out of the clan, but even within them they were all for business, to make the clan more secure. My mother once told me that children were born to be shinobi, to make the clan more powerful. But she also told me that she loved me no matter… But something tells me that she was different than most of the Uchiha," he continues, a sad smile playing on his lips at the mention of his mother.

"What do you mean?" Sakura puts down the dress and turns to face him, absently pouring them both a glass of sake. She seems only mildly interested but he knows she's absorbing his every word as if they were each a gift.

He's somewhat startled at how good it feels to tell her all of this, to talk about the _before_ , to talk about the _one day._ "It was rare to see Uchiha mothers playing with their children, to see them smile at them. I'm sure they loved them but…" he pauses to find his wording and takes a sip of his sake. "Most of them were like my father. Looking back now, I know he loved me and Aniki, but that wasn't his main focus. Our power was," he adds with some scorn. "It'll be different this time though."

She smiles, now showing her full engrossment in the conversation. "How so?"

He smiles and looks over at the bed, then back to his sake. "Our children will wear red," he decides. "They'll know that they're loved, and they won't be born to be weapons, or to make the Uchiha stronger."

She smiles and pours them both another cup. "How many children are we talking here?" she asks in a teasing tone.

"Well… I don't know, I've never really thought of it," he admits. "We could have one or five or none at all, it doesn't really matter I think."

Her eyes soften at this, and she taps her finger to her chin. "Well… When I used to imagine being your wife," she starts, blushing slightly at the admittance that she'd definitely thought of this before. "I thought we'd have four kids, two girls and two boys. Two with pink hair and two with black!" she tells him excitedly, giggling when she's finished.

He can't help but chuckle back. "That many, hm?"

"Yeah! And we'd live in a big house, with a garden we'd grow tomatoes in, and I'd hang the laundry up in front of it in the back yard, and we'd have family dinner every Sunday with my parents!" She's flapping her hands around happily now, and he has to admit the picture she paints is a very pretty one.

There's only one problem… "Sakura."

"Yes, Anata?"

"It might be quite a few years until we go back to live there," he tells her reservedly. He knows that she knows this, but it still leaves a pang of guilt in his chest as he says the words.

Though she exclaims without a beat's delay, "That's fine, Sasuke-kun!" He raises an eyebrow to her and she blushes again. "I have it all planned out," she admits in a smaller voice. "I'm a medic-nin after all, only second to Shishou and—"

"You're second to no one now," he interrupts because it's true. "You surpassed her during the war."

Her face is so much the color of tomatoes that it makes him slightly hungry. "You… You really think so?" He nods and takes another sip of sake innocently. "Well then, I'm the _best_ medic-nin then! So I can take care of a pregnancy on the road, and we can stay in the safer villages that need help, like back in Ametaiga, and I can still practice medical ninjutsu until my third trimester, and medicine without chakra until I give birth. It would be the same at the hospital back home!" she assures him, and goes on, fully rambling now. "And you could help in rebuilds, and when the baby's born, we can even take to defense jobs, taking turns with the baby in an inn while the other goes to fight. We could make it work, I mean it won't be the most normal…" she trails off and affixes him with a strong gaze, her brows furrowed. "But this is you and me we're talking about here, Sasuke-kun! We can do it!" There's a pleading to her voice and he finally realizes she's trying to convince him, like he wouldn't be okay with it.

He has to admit, the thought of being on the road with an infant is scary, but the fact _of_ a possible infant is more terrifying by half. Besides, part of the reason he's stayed away this long—aside from redemption—is to protect the village from the enemies he gains from having the Sharingan. It's much harder to pin down a moving target, and if he were to create more Sharingan in his children, where would be safer than with him?

There's also the possible threat looming over the entire world… But he refuses to ruin this perfect night with such thoughts. He realizes Sakura is staring at him, waiting for his answer, and he clears his throat to act as if he was thinking it over. "You're not even pregnant yet, Sakura," he teases, which is quickly becoming his favorite pastime. Her face falls, and he leans forward to brush their noses. "But when that happens," he pauses to kiss her were lazy desire. "I told you, you annoying woman, I'm not leaving until you tell me to."

She laughs and picks up one of the silken Uchiwa patches to show him. "Kinda hard to do that now, don't you think, Sasuke-kun?"

He trails his hand between her legs and kisses her pulse line before whispering seductively in her ear, "I guess my plan worked then." She moans lightly when he rubs his finger over her clothed core. "To bed, _Tsuma_."

* * *

**The plot didn't move very much this chapter, but I wanted to take as much time as I could on the wedding night, since I left you with nothing at the end of the last chapter! I actually enjoyed writing the lemon part this time! xD Pain pills? Maybe! With that said, sorry for any mistakes/choppiness if there's anything that screams at you, let me know!**

**Again, thank you so much to everyone who has commented so far! Keep them coming! I'm so happy about how much you guys seem to like this story, and I just want to take the time to thank all of my readers. I started this story because I needed an explanation of the time gap, but also because the love between these two has spoken to me since I was a child, and I want to do them justice. I care about these characters a lot :)  
Writing is also my escape, as much as reading is, so I hope I'm able to give you all the feels I get from writing this.**

**~Also! WHAT IS THIS BULLSHIT ABOUT WAITING TWO WEEKS FOR THE FINAL FIGHT!? I hope the animation is movie quality guys, or I might lose it... I can't believe it's ending :'( What will we all do with our lives?**

**Anyway, let me know what you think, and as always have a wonderful day you guys! Love you all!**


	17. Birthday Gifts

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Heya! I know, another two chapters in two days? When you're on a roll, you're on a roll I guess. Though this doesn't time skip within the chapter very much, A LOT happens, so pay attention boys and girls! I have more stuff to say, but you'll have to wait til the end of the chapter to read it hehe.
> 
> I'm so excited to finally get to this part in our plot here.
> 
> Enjoy!

 

Married life seems to suite both Sasuke and Sakura very well now. They've been married for six weeks, and each day they learn a little more about each other and themselves. The most shocking for Sasuke was the fact that Sakura decided not to tell anyone about the fact that they _were_ married until they made it back to Konaha. When he asked her about it, she simply laughed and told him it's not something people like to hear in a letter, and they'd more likely than not be tracked down. He had scowled at that, and she pointed at him to make her point. For Sakura, it had been Sasuke's incessant need to have the Uchiwa on her back showing at all times. This had come up last week, when she went to put her travelling cloak on, and he snatched it from her with a little too much force. It was summer now, he had tried to assure her, and he simply didn't want her to be too hot. But like always, she saw right through him, and the next time they stopped, she sewed an Uchiwa to the back of her cloak as best she could. She joked a child could have done a better job, but he was just relieved it was there, for the world to see.

He isn't alone anymore.

He has a family now.

It is now his sole duty to make her, his family happy.

All of that constantly being on his mind brings him to today, a scorching hot day in a little village on the border of Waterfalls and the Land of Earth, looking for a birthday present for his wife. Her birthday was March 28th, but he had, being his shitty self, passed by the occasion as any other day. It wasn't that he had forgotten, he just thought nothing of it, and she had been to afraid to say anything. But one thing he had learned from Sakura in the last few days was that birthdays were important to her, for she was throwing him a "party" for just the two of them tonight, since it happened to July 23rd. Not that he cared if he was 20 now, it was just a number to him. But the look on her face this morning when she had kicked him out of the little apartment they had rented while he was fixing the water system, and she was curing the poisoning the old system had caused, was too beautiful to deny.

He of course, hadn't told her this, he simply grunted and poked her seal before going out to his work. But that had got him thinking, he had missed a chance to make her happy on her birthday. Though she was probably used to it, since he had never cared about birthdays before, nor had he ever been there for one. So with that familiar pang of guilt in his chest, he had decided to get her something while he was out.

This is why he's walking through the little shopping district of the village, looking at every vendor for answers. What do you get a girl whose heart you destroyed time and time again without a second thought for the birthday that you blatantly ignored? So far, he's found nothing at all. She likes books, to a nearly addictive level. Ever since she stopped drinking-the night of their wedding-she's spent every night, no matter where they are, buried in a book. However, because of this addiction, she has more books than he thinks ever possible to read in a human life span sealed away in four scrolls in her pack.

Sighing, he stops in the middle of the street and does a 360, burying the urge to rip his hair out. He finished his work earlier today, and Sakura cured her last patient two days ago, so tomorrow they'll leave to go towards the Hidden Rain, and probably stop by to check on Karin and Juugo. They're only staying the night for his damn birthday, and he can't even find something simple to make her smile.

He grunts because he's so close to giving up entirely that he decides to be generic, choosing a jewelry shop. Girls like jewelry don't they?

"Welcome!" the shop owner calls and he ignores her.

It's only when he looks around for several minutes does he realize that he's never seen Sakura wear a single piece of jewelry, she is a kunoichi-the best kunoichi-after all.

"Can I help you find anything, young man?" the old woman asks with a smile that's missing several teeth.

He sighs again, and faces her fully, preparing for the conversation in his mind. "I need a birthday gift for my wife," he informs her in his bored way.

"Oh? When is it?" she asks as she starts to look around with him.

"A little over five months ago," he tells her while looks at the earrings. Are Sakura's ears even pierced?

As expected, the old woman gives him a double take, and soon notices the swords protruding out from behind his left shoulder. "You must be a shinobi then?"

"Aa, we are." He browses over the rings, would she maybe like a wedding ring? When they were with Ino before her wedding, she had mentioned they were popular.

"Oh! Is it that nice pink-haired young woman who's been helping everyone?"

He can't help but smile slightly when he says "Yes," because not only is it true, he's very proud of that fact.

"Then it's on the house!" the woman declares as a pair of little ruby-clad barrettes that are the same color as the red dresses she's worn since they were children catch his eye.

He looks over to the woman and uses the voice he only uses to end conversations that make him want to sow his mouth shut on when he says, "No, I will purchase these barrettes for my _wife,_ if you don't mind."

That seems to be the end to that little conversation. He knows he hands the lady too much money, but he doesn't wait for his change or for her to wrap the box to leave. Can't have it looking like he put too much effort into it, even if he did spend three hours driving himself half mad looking for these damn things.

* * *

"HAPPY BIRTHDAY SASUKE-KUN!" Sakura screams the moment he opens the door, and jumps on him in a big hug he expected, but hadn't quite braced himself for. His back hits the wall with an audible thud, and a little crack forms up the wall from right behind his right shoulder blade. Sakura notices this and immediately releases him with a loud laugh and a wave of her hands.

He simply pokes her seal. "Sakura."

"I made dinner, come! Sit!" she calls and sits down at the low table off to the side of the one roomed apartment. He raises an eyebrow at the spread. "Okay... I ordered out, but I put them all on the dishes!" she admits happily.

He slips off his shoes, and makes his way to the table, laughing a free laugh he's learned to use to make Sakura happy. The table is filled with momotaro, tomato gunkin-maki, tomato salad with with sesame seeds, tomato nabe, and plain white rice. Instead of a cake, it seems she picked every tomato dish from the tea house down the street, and he can't help but thank whatever gods are out there for giving him this amazingly annoying woman.

"Think you got enough food, _Tsuma?"_ he teases as he usually does now.

"Oh shut up and eat, _Anata,_ " she teases back with a wave of her chopsticks.

The meal is shared with a companionable silence, neither needing to break it as they eat their fill and then some. When he finally relinquishes his chopsticks with a contented sigh, she shoots up and goes to the kitchenette to bring back a rather large package.

"Happy birthday, Sasuke-kun! I didn't know what to get you, so I got some useful things," she tells him as she sits beside him and hands the dark blue-wrapped box over.

It's neatly wrapped, no unnecessary decorations on it, but it's still a beautiful paper. A part of him notes that that's the same way he'd describe their new marriage. She even cut it down one side already so he could easily open it with one hand. With a smile, he rids the box of its paper and removes the lid, setting both aside on the table neatly before inspecting the contents. Inside are two pale lavender vests and a black but rather stylish if you were to ask him cloak. Underneath the clothing, is a new hip harness for his sword. Looking down, he notices the chest harness he has _is_ a little worn

"They didn't have a chest one at any of the shops I went to," Sakura explained, a blush emerging on her face. "And I know lavender isn't a color you've ever worn, but I think it would look nice on you, and it was the dullest color they had. Not saying that you're dull or anything, I just know how you like to dress, how you always have and I just… Well maybe it was stupid, I should have just gotten you different shirts, you've never worn ves—"

"Sakura, shut up," he orders with a smirk, holding up one of the vests in his hand.

"Y-yes…"

He stands up and motions for her to as well with his chin. "Help me with this off?"

"Y-yes, Anata."

Sakura makes quick work of his harness, laying his Kusinagi down on the table with care. He hands her the vest and though he could put it on himself, he lets her ghost her fingers over his clothed skin as she slips the durable silk over his long-sleeved black shirt. When he looks down, she's blushing madly as she zips up the front of the vest. It fits perfectly, almost as if it were made for him. Just another testament to how well she knows him.

"I like it," he assures her.

She blushes and smiles up at him, bashfully fluttering her eye lashes. "It does look nice."

The moment almost turns heated, when he remembers the little grey box in his pocket. "Sit down," he orders. When she complies, he pulls out the little box and slides it over on the table in front of her. "For your birthday," he says as if it doesn't matter.

The look on her face when she looks inside nearly blinds him for the brightness. "Sasuke-kun! They're beautiful!"

"Hn, I happened to see them in a jewelry shop in town earlier. Like them?"

She beams up at him before throwing her arms around his neck and planting sweet kisses all over his face that he pretends to hate. "Of course I do!"

She shuffles on to his lap, and continues the movement of her lips perfectly over his. Letting out a throaty noise, he whispers to against her mouth, "To bed, Tsuma."

* * *

They leave early the next morning, heading south on a surprisingly busy pathway. In an hour or so the sun will set, and they'll be halfway to Karin's hideout, which is exactly what Sasuke has been waiting for all day. About three weeks ago he sent out a missive to all of his contacts he still maintained from the prisoners of Orochimaru's he freed. The missive was simple, so simple there was no way any of them, even if they were one of the smarter experiments, could figure out what he was really after. He simply sent them all a list of words and asked that if anything stood out to them about _all_ of the words to leave a message at a mile marker on the very pathway they were currently walking.

The words went as follows, a carefully crafted list of criteria he'd come up with to determine if any information was pertinent:

_Rabbit, Mother, Fathers, Harvest, Devine, Shinome (this was the poison listed in the text Sakura had found), and Zetsu._

He hasn't been able to find anything since his big breakthrough right before their wedding, so he's not all too hopeful that there will be anything at all when they reach the mile marker, but if Sakura knew about all of this, she'd tell him to not give up. So he's not.

Speaking of Sakura, she's been quiet for the last few hours. Looking down at her now, she looks fine, contented even as she walks along the path with him and holds his empty sleeve. But there's something off, maybe in her stride? Calling upon the Sharingan quickly enough that she won't notice, he can see that it is in fact the normal way she walks. Her chakra looks a little disturbed though, almost like she's exhausted only her levels are normal.

He shrugs to himself, it must just be the effects of healing so many people these last few weeks, he decides. Though if he still feels like something's off he'll ask her when they make camp in little bit, before he goes to collect the scrolls.

If there are any at all.

* * *

They finally come up to the marker before the one he's to collect the information from about an hour later.

"Let's camp off to the side here," he tells her, veering off the path into the woods to find a suitable place.

"I can keep going, Sasuke-kun," she tells him but she yawns a few moments later and he smirks at her. Luckily, there won't be a fight to get her to rest tonight like there usually is.

"You set up camp, I'll go get some firewood. I'll be back," he orders before poking her seal and smiling back when she offers him a tired one.

Summoning a clone to collect the firewood for him, he quickly runs ahead to the mile marker with anticipation knotting his stomach. All day, he's been trying to tell himself that there's most likely not going to be anything there. If he hasn't found anything, it's doubtful a bunch of Orochimaru's rejects will be able to. But there's still that little ray of hope that he can only think to blame on Sakura, that's clouding his mind.

The sooner he can ascertain the threat and figure out what to do about it, the sooner he can move on with his life fully. Sure, he's made an amazing amount of progress in the last six months since him and Sakura left the village together, but even if he's fully redeemed himself he won't be able to settle down to give her the life she deserves until this threat has passed. And so far he's just _barely_ starting to understand what it even is.

The sun is finally fully set and only a few people a couple hundred feet ahead and behind him litter the path, the only ones who can see what he's doing as he unseals the marker is the moon and the cicadas chirping away with the crickets. He reaches his hand in the little opening for a good minute, swirling it around trying desperately to find even just a scrap of paper, but his stomach end up sinking as he sits on the ground next to it and buries his head in his hand.

There's nothing. Quickly, he releases the clone he has out collecting wood and summons another one with orders to stay with Sakura until she falls asleep. He knows there's no way she'd be able to miss the dejected look on his face, and his clone will be able to focus better, knowing that the original is working everything out in his head.

After a good hour of silent contemplation—okay more like a silent panic attack—the sound of hawk circling above brings him back to the world. Looking around with his Sharingan in the pale waning moonlight, he can't see a single human's chakra anywhere near him. And yet, the hawk seems to have found the place it's supposed to be.

Sighing, he stands up and holds out his arm for the creature to land. He doesn't recognize its chakra, or the style of Jess around its ankle. He places the bird on the mile marker, so he can retrieve the tiny scroll it carries. 'Leave it to Orochimaru's experiments to not be able to follow simple instructions,' he thinks with scorn after he's placed the note in his pocket and retrieved a treat that he uses for his own birds. The creature takes it gratefully, and even lets him pet its head the way Garuda (his largest hawk summoning) makes him every time he's summoned.

Eventually the bird leaves him, still without telling the secrets of its owner, and he sighs as he starts walking back to Sakura. Summoning his Sharingan to both see better in the dark, and ingrain any information that's important in his memory, he pulls out the little rolled up piece of paper and immediately stops dead in his tracks when he doesn't recognize the handwriting. He made sure to catalogue everyone's response to his missive in his head so he'd know who gathered the information for him, but this scrawl is different. He can barely read it; the kanji are shaky and uneven as if someone was terrified, extremely ill or just terribly old when they took a trembling pen to paper.

When his Sharingan finally helps him decipher the illegible scribbles, he immediately back tracks, scanning the entire area for any more crazy people like that woman, any shady pranksters, any one at all.

_Stand upon its root_

_This time, leave the rabbit be_

_Open up the door_

_Use the Sage's eye to see_

_You'll be in Mother's world again_

_Step forward hastily_

_There, you'll find the answers that you seek_

There's no one around though, not a soul in sight, and he finally falls to his knees in the middle of the pitch black woods with a terrified chill running up his spine. No matter how many times he reads the paper, he comes to the same conclusion. It seems like it's telling him to find another root fragment and open up a time-space portal with his Rinnegan, and then he'll be in Kaguya's dimension again. But that's not the part that has him hyperventilating on the ground.

_This time, leave the rabbit be_

Are they referring to the old lady at that rabbit shrine? Do they know she ran herself through on his sword after he tried to talk to her? Or just that he burned the rabbit shrine until there weren't even ashes left with Amaterasu? Either way… Someone knows where he is, where he's been and what he's looking for. And that someone wants him to go back into Kaguya's dimensions.

So, leaving aside how unbelievable creepy and unnerving it is that somehow he's been/is being watched and neither himself nor Sakura have noticed, this begs two questions that weigh heavily on his mind as he walks through the quicksand air back to Sakura:

Are these people trying to help him keep the world safe by helping him investigate the threat?

Or are they trying to make it easier for the "harvest" to happen?

* * *

The next day the travelling is slow as neither of them got much sleep the night before. Sakura said it was just how loud the crickets and cicadas were after sleeping in a peaceful apartment for the last couple of weeks, but he has a feeling she's lying. Her chakra is at normal levels still, but the way it's circulating when he looks at her with the Sharingan still reminds him of exhaustion, but she won't let him fuss over her as usual.

Sasuke, of course, couldn't sleep for reading the note over and over again until he burnt it with the Amaterasu this morning before Sakura woke up. He managed to get at least an hour or two of restless sleep, but the closer they got to Karin's hideout the more excited he got to face plant on the nearest mattress to the entrance.

Sakura's giggles cause him to pause as the reach the last hundred meters or so of their journey and he looks in the direction of her pointing finger. A bright red head is quickly coming towards them, waving her lavender clad arms around frantically. The pinkette beside him waves back while laughing fully now, and gets a second wind as she leaves him behind to run up to Karin.

Sighing, but with a little smirk he picks up the pace to catch up to the hugging women ahead of him.

"Sasuke-kun! Welcome back!" Karin drops the pinkette and quickly tries to hug him, but he dodges it in a way he's been practicing since he first met her. She's not discouraged though and keeps laughing.

"Karin," he greets in a bored and half-dead tone.

"I see you've changed your outfit!" She turns to address Sakura, "Did you go to that place I told you about?"

"Yeah, you were right! The designer was really nice, and I got him two of those, and a cloak too!" Sakura beams back.

He looks down at his vest, then back to Karin, then back to his vest. The "v" shape at the bottom is identical, and though a little duller, her staple jacket and his new vest are practically the same color.

The women are babbling on, but he's not paying attention when he interrupts, "You dressed me like Karin?"

"AHAHAAHAHAH No, Sasuke-kun! Well, you see…" Sakura continues to loudly laugh and wave her arms, and Karin is half keeled over beside her as the reach the doors to the hideout.

"You dressed _me_ like _Karin_?" he reiterates.

"Oh hush, Anata! It just looks a little similar since it was made by the same person! I would hardly say you're dressed like Karin, calm down," Sakura tries.

"I have to say, he pulls it off better than me," Karin adds while pushing up her glasses and ushering them inside.

The moment they're in the living quarters, Sasuke tries to unzip the vest, only for the top of his head to be crushed the moment the zipper moves down.

"Hey! Your wife bought that for you for your birthday, jerk! So you're wearing it, Shanaroo!"

"Wife?" Karin asks and they both look over to her as she blinks and examines the crest on Sakura's back.

Can't he just have one casual encounter with his friends? Must everyone be so damned loud every time?

Sakura laughs nervously again, for the umpteenth time since they arrived not ten minutes ago. "Well, you see…" she trails off, obviously as wary of telling his former and possibly current fan girl of their nuptials.

But, as she does most people, it seems Sakura was able to change Karin in a way. Because though she looks dejected slightly, she walks over slowly and gives Sakura another, calmer hug. When her arms close around the pinkette, Sasuke notices something in her face change from sad to understanding then to… happy? And he finds himself believing her when she tells them both in what he takes as a heartfelt manner, "Congratulations."

Sakura seems thrilled with this, and claps her hands together when she's released from the hug. "Right! Well, I haven't had a drink in a while, and we're tired but how about we all celebrate and catch up before bed, Shanaroo? Eh, Sasuke-kun?"

Sighing, he's about to reply that he could use a drink, though he isn't about to tell either of them about the troubling revelations last night brought him, when Karin's face turns from happy to very confused. She looks back and forth between them both of their faces undoubtedly as confused as her own now for several moments before she speaks.

"Do you think that's the best idea Sakura-chan?" she asks timidly looking at him in a way that kind of makes him think she wants back up to stop Sakura from drinking. But the last time they were here, it seemed to be their favorite activity with each other, so he just raises his eyebrows back at her expectant face.

"Why wouldn't it be a good idea, Karin-chan?" Sakura mirrors his thoughts. "Afraid I'll drink you under the table again?" she tries to joke, but Karin just steps closer to her and closes her eyes like she's concentrating really hard on something.

His exhausted mind can't seem to figure out what's going on, and he really just wants that drink, or to go to bed right now. He doesn't have the energy to figure out confusing or annoying women at the moment. His wife is enough to deal with.

Karin finally opens her eyes, but it's just to gasp and look between their confused faces a few more times. She grabs Sakura's hand and pulls her towards the labs out of nowhere, ordering, "Come with my Pinky! Sasuke-kun take her bags, now!"

Sakura and he share a wary look, communicating that neither of them know what's going on with their eyes. Too tired to question or fight back, he takes Sakura's offered bag when they reach the lab and gratefully sinks in to his favorite couch in the lab, close enough to see what's going on but far enough away as to stay out of the danger-zone.

Karin pulls out a syringe, and his heart sinks. "Are you sick?" he demands of his wife, already back on his feet beside her.

She looks at him with wide eyes. "I don't think so…?" she responds, looking to Karin and offering her arm when she waves for it.

"Karin-chan what's going on?" she wonders out loud as she holds Sasuke's hand, most likely to keep him calm more than for the pain of the needle.

"It could be nothing, just let me check and I'll tell you, Pinky."

"Karin," he warns as she withdraws the needle and takes his wife's blood to a machine a few feet away. She waves her hand in dismissal towards him, and inserts the blood into the machine before pressing a bunch of buttons and nodding when she hears a click. She walks back over to the monitor in front of them, and looks intently at it.

"What tests are you running?" Sakura asks a little dazed.

"Just a standard blood panel. There's something up with your chakra and I have an idea as to why, but I don't wanna freak you out if there's no need to," she responds, without looking away from the monitor.

"I noticed it too, but I thought she was just tired," he adds, holding on to Sakura's hand for dear life.

The world is spinning slightly. First that note, now this? What if she got sick while out on the road with him, or maybe he didn't fix the water system in the last village well enough and she got sick from that? What if she's dying? He _just_ married her, he hasn't given her anything of the things she deserves in life now, and now he might lose her. She'll be just another Uchiha name on the stone monument where the compound used to be and it'll all be his fault. Even if it's something she couldn't have avoided, she wasted so much of her life waiting for his sorry ass, and she _just_ got what she wanted. It'd be too tragic, but then again what did he expect thinking he could be happ—

"Oh my god!" Sakura gasps, pulling him out of his dark train of thought.

Immediately he looks at the screen, but he can't decipher any of the information on it. "What!? What does it say? What's wrong?" he demands but Sakura is frozen looking at the screen. He turns to Karin's smug looking face and drops Sakura's hand to slam the redhead against the counter. "TELL ME WHAT IS WRONG WITH HER, KARIN!" he orders, yelling at the top of his lungs.

Karin pries his hand off of her and smiles at him, before gesturing to the screen. He moves back so she can go up to it and point at a line in the results labeled "HCG" with a number 5 next to it. He looks back at her with an angry and confused scowl. She sighs and pushes up her glasses. "Based on that," she gestures back to the number five, "she is about three to four weeks pregnant."

It takes a moment for it to register, as he stares at the number five like it's the most important thing he'll ever see. Maybe because it _is_ the most important thing he'll ever see.

Sakura is pregnant.

With a baby.

A baby that they talked about having in the _future_ only six and half weeks ago.

There is a tiny human living in his wife.

And he put said tiny human in there.

"I'm having a baby?" Sakura finally speaks and he looks at her with wide eyes. She's crying, the tears slipping down her cheeks as she smiles at him. "We're having a baby?" she asks again.

"Right, well I'm gonna go see if Juugo is back yet… Have fun with… This," he hears Karin's voice receding but he doesn't care about it.

"You're pregnant," he states back, his muscles locked from shock.

"We're having a baby!" she exclaims again.

"You're pregnant," he repeats.

Her arms fling around him when he doesn't move, she's obviously worried that he's in shock, but of course he is. His family doubled only less than two months ago, now there's going to be another very new and very innocent Uchiha.

Even more innocent than Sakura is, as a child that will be born after the war.

An Uchiha that will be born without knowing anything about or having anything to do with the massacre of everyone else.

A child born knowing nothing about his crimes or his sins.

A child born needing love from him even more than Sakura does, love that he's still figuring out how to give.

A child born loving him, when he's still not even sure how to handle his _wife_ loving him.

A child born needing him to take care of it, even though he still barely knows how to do that for himself.

"You're going to be a dad," Sakura whispers in his ear, telling him everything he needs to know to calm down.

A child will be born that is equal parts his and Sakura's.

A tear slips past his guard as the words "Thank you," leave his lips and he finally wraps his arm around the love of his life's back.

The Uchiha clan will finally have a new member by blood, a new member with the Sharingan. And for the first time in gods knows how long, that new member will be born from nothing but love.

* * *

**Wooooooooooooot! Sakura is knocked up, boys and girls! I decided to do this now, because when researching to make this cannon, I saw everyone's ages in Boruto and... Well Sasuke is 32/33 and Sakura is 33 and Sarada was 12 which means in cannon, about a year after the Last Sarada is born, so I had to put it there. But also I was excited to do this chapter :3**

**Also, did you all know that Sarada's birthday is three days after Sakura's? :o I think that's adorable!**

**Anyhoo, so that's why this is happening at this point.**

**As for what's going on in Sasuke's mission... Well you'll have to stay tuned to find out, I have a plan and we're not even close to done with it . Mwahahahahaa! Take that as a good or bad thing, your decision!**


	18. On a Cloudy Day

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Heya guys! Back so soon? :o
> 
> This all came out of my brain and it doesn't follow the original plan I had, but that's good for you guys! Cuz our story just got at least two chapters longer than I planned! YAY! We're still not close to the end though :( or is it :) I'm not sure!
> 
> Oba means Aunt and Oji means Uncle by the way
> 
> Kinpira gobo is a kind of spicy stir fry with burdock root
> 
> Kocha Gammon is basically like a ham that's marinated in black tea
> 
> Anyhoo more authors notes at the end as per uzhe...
> 
> Enjoy!

 

 

 

_Sakura-chan, Sasuke-teme! Guess what!_

_Hinata-chan is pregnant you guys! I'm gonna be a dad ya'know! Miss you guys! And Teme you better be taking care of Sakura-chan. Don't be afraid to write like, ever you guys. I have so many questions but I know you won't answer any of them, but maybe Sakura-chan can write me since Teme is too constipated?_

_Your AMAZING future Hokage!_

_Papa Naruto ya'know!_

Sakura had given him the small letter a few minutes ago before she ran to go throw up. Apparently it smelled like ramen and even though she ate four bowls yesterday the smell was repulsive today. He reads the note a few more times before walking back to their bedroom in Karin's hideout.

Sakura may have planned out how to travel while pregnant, but she had overlooked the morning sickness, so they're basically trapped here until it's over. She assures him every morning that she's ready to leave, before running away to throw up again right after. They could still leave, sure the constant stopping to puke would slow them down, but even though it's fall now the weather hasn't gotten the memo. When it's not a constant downpour it's over 100 degrees and Sasuke deems it unfit for the very ill mother of his child to travel in. It still doesn't stop her from arguing _every_ day though.

He walks up to the bathroom and takes a deep breath before putting on his most caring face and preparing his most soothing voice, even if the smell makes him want to join her on the floor. Without knocking he enters to find Sakura on her knees in front of the toilet.

"Are you okay?" he asks, pleased with how much like a coo it comes out as. He's finding it much easier to make the outside match the inside now that she's carrying their child.

"Fucking Naruto-baka," she mutters before retching the rest of her stomach contents into the waiting toilet.

Sitting down on the side of the tub next her, he uses the spout to wet a wash cloth and run it over the back of her neck. After a few moments she seems to be done and looks up at him while flushing the contents away. He diligently uses the cloth to first wipe the sweat from her brow, then moves on to the sick around her mouth while she smiles up at him looking near tears at his gesture. They've become much more comfortable with each other since finding out about the baby eight weeks ago, though what could one expect when helping his puking wife every single day?

It's the little things, all uncomfortable at first that slowly became just another part of their day. The first time Sakura got morning sickness she had barricaded the door and hadn't reemerged until she had washed herself and her mouth and fixed her hair, only to run back to the bathroom an hour later when he had tried to make her lunch. It was another battle to let him help her, but she was soon desperate enough to accept it. However, she only even conceded to that after she had tried every remedy she knew as a doctor, and found that nothing helped.

The gas was a new one as well, starting last week. She once again started running to the bathroom every time it hit, but he had gone behind her back to ask Karin what he could do for that one, and she had handed him a baby book she'd purchased for when he started asking questions. He nearly had to trap her for her let him rub her belly to help with the pain the first few times, but he was getting much better at wearing down his wife. He wasn't sure if that was because of the pregnancy or just a natural progression of marriage, but as long as the stubborn woman let him help, he was satisfied.

Karin had told him most fathers wouldn't be interested in all of this, in fact most would need to be forced to help with a puking and gassy wife. But he wasn't most fathers. Most fathers had a family outside of their wives to focus on, a mother to tell them what to expect, a father to tell them to ignore the "woman business" but all Sasuke has is Sakura. Beyond that, he put this child in her and even though he knows she loves their baby as much as he does, he feels guilty every time it causes her discomfort. She's giving—has given—him everything he could have ever hoped for in life, what's a little awkwardness for him?

The baby book, which was for women he noticed, had also mentioned that the mother shouldn't get too worried if the father isn't as excited about the baby as she is. It had even gone as far as to say "A mother becomes a mother when she finds out that she's pregnant; a father doesn't become a father until the baby is born." It was astonishing to him if that was true, but he had to remind himself over and over that most fathers hadn't been dreaming of children in one way or another for most of their lives. The moment he found out he was to become a father, there was this shift in his entire being that while reminiscent of the shift when Sakura had first put on the Uchiwa, was infinitely more powerful. Sakura may have become part of the Uchiha clan, but she wasn't his blood. For the first time since his brother died there was another living person on the planet that shared the unbreakable tie of blood.

Of course he was already a father, of course he would go slightly insane every time Sakura would make a face that might look pained thinking she was miscarrying, of course he would help her with every single thing he could.

"Naruto and Hinata-chan are having a baby," Sakura says softly, pulling him out of his thoughts and knowingly so. She scoots back against the wall and sighs contentedly when places a new wet cloth on her forehead.

"Hn."

"I wish we could tell them our news too," before he can interject as always, she waves her hand lazily to stop them. "I know we haven't talked about it but I already guessed your answer and why."

He smirks. "Oh? And what did you come up with?"

"Even if we sent the most secure message, someone could still intercept it and figure it out. And even if that doesn't happen _no one_ would keep their mouth shut about the baby." She places a hand over her lower stomach and crinkles her eyes. "And we don't need it broadcasted that there's a new set of Sharingan ripe for the taking inside of me," she finishes and sticks her tongue out when she notices him visibly gulp at her wording.

"No one will get us," she assures him before bringing her hand to her bicep and clamping it down. "I'd like to see them try, Shanaroo!"

He chuckles along with her, even if the pit of his stomach is sinking with the thought of either of them being in danger.

"You better go see if Karin needs help in the lab, I don't feel like hearing her bitch any more today," he tells her with a smirk. As "rent" for staying here, Sakura has been helping Karin with her experiments. Luckily it's nothing like what Orochimaru's subordinates used to work on, but it still manages to keep both women quite busy figuring out new cell growth technique or something. He only ever pays enough attention to make sure it's nothing dangerous or morally ambiguous that might further taint his pinkette.

"Right! Are you going to go out then?" she asks as he helps her up. Ever since the note he was sent the day before they found out she was pregnant, he's been scouting for more root fragments without any luck. He gave up a little last week and started just practicing with the Rinnegan, but every time he opens the dimension, all he sees is sand, no answers or ways to the other dimensions. A part of him thinks he really does need to be on a root fragment for it to work properly, but he's trying not to focus on it.

Or the fact that someone's been watching him.

"Aa, I'll be back for dinner Tsuma."

* * *

 

Sakura's morning sickness finally dissipates in her fourteenth week, and they're planning to leave the safety of the hide out in the morning. Sasuke is trying to think on the bright side as Sakura keeps telling him to put it, they're going to be in the Hidden Rain for the next few weeks on a recon mission from Kakashi. No fighting or medicine right away, so it should be a good transition for them both after not leaving the hideout for more than a few hours the last nine weeks.

Sakura stirs beside him to roll over. Her eyes are half lidded when she looks at him and yawns. "Why aren't you sleeping, Anata?"

He brushes a loose hair from her face to kiss her brow. "Just thinking, go back to sleep Sakura."

She sighs contentedly but looks at him again. "Do you think it'll be a girl or a boy?" she whispers to him while nuzzling closer to his chest to rest her head on his stump.

"Doesn't matter really," he responds because it doesn't.

Chuckling, she informs him in her matter-of-fact way, "Everyone has a preference, Sasuke-kun. Come on it'll be fun to guess!"

"A girl, then," he decides only so she'll smile like she is now.

"Hm, what do you think they'll be like?"

That one doesn't need much thought. "Like you."

"But with your looks," she adds with a stretching yawn, allowing his hand access to her still-flat belly.

"Tch, stop being annoying and go to sleep," he tells her while rubbing a nonsense pattern on her stomach.

After a few moments of silence, just as he's about to fall asleep she speaks up again. "Sasuke-kun?"

"Hn?"

"Do you think we'll be good parents?"

He has to wait a moment to answer, he's about to say something along the lines of how unfit for fatherhood he is, or how he doesn't know how to act around children or that he's never even held a baby before when she stretches again and her smile catches his eye.

"You will be an amazing mother, Sakura," he whispers because it's true. "Now go to sleep before I change my mind," he teases.

She giggles and settles back on his stump with his other arm wrapped securely around her hip.

"I love you," she breathes.

When he's certain she's fully asleep, he whispers with all the noise of the wind, "Please don't let me fuck this up too, Sakura. I love you."

* * *

 

"Well at least it's not too hot out anymore," Sakura jokes as they cross the bridge into the Hidden Rain.

"Hn, just watch your step woman," Sasuke replies when he catches her from slipping on a puddle. Was she always so clumsy?

"Yeah, yeah let's just find some place to eat before you go talk to whoever we're here to see!" she beams, flapping her hands happily.

"I told you already, we're not here to see _anyone_ we're just here to pose as tourists and see if the region is really as stable as they're telling everyone. There's a reason we got sent here, it's not an official mission."

"Oh, right. Hey! A tea shop, let's get some food Sasuke-kun!" she yells as she's already half way to the tea shop, waving her arms at him.

Sighing, he quickly flashsteps beside her. This new scatter-brained and food driven version of Sakura is making him really miss the version that couldn't hold down rice porridge for more than an hour. If he has to chase his pregnant wife all over the place the entire time, he'll most likely end up hauling her ass back to Karin's hideout and throwing away the key just so he doesn't lose track of her.

The moment they sit down, Sakura has already waved the waiter over, not even looking at the menu on the table.

"What can I get for you two?" the old man asks with a polite smile, but his stance is that of a former Shinobi, so Sasuke quickly makes sure his bangs are covering his Rinnegan while he's focused on Sakura.

"I'd like some Kinpira gobo, and some pork gyoza with the spicy sauce! And he'll take fresh tomatoes and white rice, oh and I want jasmine tea with hon—actually no, I want black tea if you have it, and he'll take green!" she orders with a big smile.

When the waiter nods and leaves, he turns to her with raised eyebrows. "You hate spicy food more than I hate sweets."

Sakura just giggles and points to her flat stomach when her cloak is off. "The baby doesn't!"

"But you yelled at me for adding too much pepper when I cooked this _morning_ ," he reiterates.

She just shrugs and accepts their tea with a huge grin.

"Tch, annoying."

When there food arrives, Sasuke could die for the looks they get. He always thought Naruto's enthusiasm with ramen was over the top, but Sakura is finished with her entire meal before he even gets the chance to finish one tomato.

Noticing him staring as he takes a small bite of rice, she blushes and whispers, "What? I was hungry."

"Clearly," he teases.

Sakura settles back on her chair and rubs her belly happily while he continues with his meal at the pace of a sane person. "So where are we gonna stay while we're here?"

"Up to you."

"Well I was thinking maybe we could rent an apartment again, just a little one. I had Karin check for me, and there's a children's clinic that just opened up to model my own here. I'm sure they could use my help," she says casually.

Sighing, he eyes his wife with suspicion. "I thought we agreed you'd take a break after how much you worked with Karin?"

"No, _you_ agreed on that with yourself, Sasuke-kun. They need my help here!"

"And how would you know that for sure?"

As he guessed she would, she looks away guiltily. "I may have already accepted a temporary position at the clinic last week."

Pinching the bridge of his nose, he turns to fully face his wife. "You already have an apartment picked out don't you?"

"Yup, hurry up and eat, I have a meeting in an hour!"

* * *

 

"Uchiha-sensei! Welcome, we're so happy you could come help us for a few weeks!"

They're greeted by a very frazzled looking woman with dark red hair and glasses taped at the bridge and her clothes look like she bought them third-hand years ago. Maybe Sakura wasn't exaggerating when she said they needed her help.

"You must be Tanaka-sensei, I presume?" Sakura replies with a bow matching the woman's. Sasuke just watches the encounter with a stoic silence at her side. So this woman is doctor? She looks a lot closer to homeless if you were to ask him.

"Oh please, call me Sana!"

"Well then Sana-san, call me Sakura."

"Very well, shall we get on with a quick tour? I'm sure you and your companion must be wary from the road."

"Ah yes! This is my husband Sasuke Uchiha," she waves her hand at him to introduce him and he simply nods his head while looking bored. "And that sounds good to me!"

Sasuke mostly tunes out the pleasantries, but follows the woman with a close vigil to Sakura, his hand never leaving his Kusinagi under his cloak. This place may be _called_ a clinic but it looks more like a drug den, or one of Orochimaru's more obvious hideouts. They follow the woman past the lobby, both of them stopping to smile at the children lining the hallways while Sasuke is busy calculating escape roots in his head in between staring at everything's distance from her stomach.

"As you can see, we're not just a mental health clinic, but also a children's emergency clinic," the woman tells them as they continue down a long hallway. "Here are our two trauma bays," she says as she points on either side of the hallway to two rooms with some medical supplies, plain steel tables and one rickety old chair each. He's not even sure if there's electrical lighting in them.

"How many doctors do you have on staff?" Sakura asks.

"Well I'm afraid we're all volunteers here, but there are four including me as well as three nurses and four parent volunteers."

Sakura nods, obviously worried by the information. "And where do you get your supplies?"

"Well we mostly get donations from more stable parts of the city, but sadly not many people care for the orphans. Most of the supplies come out of our pockets or what we can bargain out of the hospitals we work at."

"I'll send for a care package from my own clinic back home, it won't be mu—"

"Oh my, that would be wonderful!" the woman interrupts her and they all stop as she bows lowly.

"No need to thank me, most of these kids are orphans from the circumstances surrounding the Great Wars, it's the least Konaha can do," Sakura assures her so they can continue. "How many patients do you have at any given time?"

"Around ten or so for the physical stuff, but the mental… Well we currently have 15 cases that need immediate help, but we're in over our heads I'm afraid."

"That's what I'm here for!" Sakura beams as they reach a little office at the end of the hallway and are ushered in. Sakura and Sana take seats across from each other while Sasuke stands behind her chair. There are children's toys littered all over a low table in one of the corners, and files stacked high all over the table the women sit at. There doesn't even appear to be a filing cabinet in the whole building.

"I brought all of my copies of the psychology books I have, as well as my own personal findings from back home. It won't be easy, but I'd like to train all of you rather than just helping the patients, so when I leave…" she trails of when the woman nods and reaches out for her hand.

"Thank you so much, just you being here will hopefully bring the village's attention to our clinic, and hopefully we can start getting real funding."

Sakura squeezes the woman's hand with an assuring smile and reaches into her bag with the other one to pull out all of the money she has on her—about 6000 ryo (540$ thanks google)—and places it on the table. The woman looks down with wide eyes.

"Uchiha-sensei, what's that…?"

"Call it a donation or a finder's fee for finding us a place to stay while we're here, whatever you like."

"But…"

Sakura holds up her hand and Sasuke thinks his wife has lost her mind. "No, no. Now half of that is for the clinic, and half is for you." The woman goes to speak but Sakura stops her. "Ah-ah-ah listen, you started this clinic, right?" The woman nods and stares at the money. "Well I started mine as well, and that was _with_ getting paid for it and a new building and full staff and I still nearly lost my mind for the stress. You can't take care of anyone else if you're not taken care of. The training I'm going to give you… Well you're going to be dealing with a lot of heavy stuff from now on, and if you're not careful it can really get to you. So I want you take half of that and take yourself to the bath house and relax, maybe go have a drink with some friends and come back tomorrow looking a lot less drained, got it?"

"Y-yes Uchiha-sens—"

"Sakura."

"Right, yes Sakura-san."

"Oh and one last thing before we leave," Sakura says while rummaging in her bag for a scroll. When she finds the one she needs, she unseals a little book and hands it to her. "Read this tonight. And think over what I'm about to ask you because I'm going to ask it again tomorrow, okay?"

"Yes."

"As much as you care about these kids, you're going to _have_ to distance yourself from them okay? If you get too invested, the treatments won't work and you won't be able to help them. So, do you think you'll be able to do that?" Sakura asks with a detached business tone he's never heard before.

"But wouldn't being attached help more than not caring too much?"

"No. I know from experience, trust me. When you're dealing with someone with a traumatized mind, showering them with affection will only annoy them and getting invested in the outcome will only hurt you in the long run," she pauses and looks back at Sasuke so briefly that the civilian woman probably doesn't even notice. "Listen Sana-san, these kids _will_ let you down, they _will_ make mistakes that their untraumatized peers won't make and they _will_ do things that don't make sense to you. Patience is the key here and when you stand to get hurt when they make a wrong turn it can mess it all up because you'll be too quick to try and stop them or too quick to punish them when you can't."

The woman nods but still looks confused.

"Any questions?"

"Just one, um… Shouldn't we _try_ to stop all of that though? Isn't that what we're here for?"

"No, that's the mistake I made once… Just saying 'please don't do it' will only make them want to do it more. Some people just need to learn from experience, especially if they're still healing. We're here to support them and teach them how things should be done, and how to cope with their traumas and with life. But that doesn't mean that they'll always listen, and when they do make a mistake or do something crazy, an invested person will simply jump to anger or punishment. It's very important to find out the _why_ of their mistakes and what was going through their minds when they made them. And to do that, you have to keep them at arm's length but still have that supporting hand on them. Make sense?"

"Yes, I wouldn't have ever thought of that," she pauses with a thoughtful face before looking back up to Sakura. "You're amazing," Sana tells her in earnest, bowing her head slightly when Sakura gets up.

"So I've been told. We'll start tomorrow!"

* * *

 

"Aaahh! Home sweet home!" Sakura says as she drops her bags and stretches. The apartment is tiny and barely furnished, but at least it's dry.

Sasuke hasn't spoken since they left the clinic two hours ago, with everything Sakura told the doctor there continuously replaying in his mind. If she's noticed she hasn't let on yet, as she goes about unsealing all of their food from the scrolls and putting it away in the kitchenette. Sasuke walks over to the dresser under the little tv in the far end of the room and begins unsealing all of their clothes and refolding them neatly before putting them away.

"You figured it out didn't ya?" Sakura breaks the silence once her unpacking is finished and she starts to make some black tea—her new favorite this week.

"Figured what out?"

"Oh come on, Sasuke-kun! You've never been one to beat around the bush," she pauses to drain the leaves and finally looks him squarely in the eye from across the room. "I was talking about you back there. I started that clinic because of you, you know."

Sitting back on his heels, he nods. "I kind of guessed that when I first heard of it."

Sakura looks a little uncertain as she brings him a glass of strong, bitter tea. "You're not… mad about that are you?"

When she sits next to him, they're both looking pointedly ahead now. Both are staring at one of her shirts on the tatami in front of the dresser with the Uchiwa glaring back at them, daring to look away.

"Why would something like that bother me?"

When he looks at her from the corner of the eye that's shielded with his bangs, he can't help but feel guilty that she looks so scared. When she replies it's barely a whisper, "Because it means that you're sick too."

If anyone else were to say that, even in the same uninsulting context, he can't see himself being anything less than pissed off and offended. But the sad smile on Sakura's face when she finally swallows her fear and looks at him forces his higher functions to understand what she means. Even to this day his mind will play tricks on him, and he'll lose himself a little every time it does. Hell, when he was a teenager he went completely and undeniably—even to himself—insane.

She's right, so he whispers back with a thoughtful smile, "I wonder how different everything would have gone if there were someone like you to help me when I was a kid."

Neither of them mentions that she _tried_ to help him when they were kids. She had said it perfectly to that woman earlier; her methods were never going to work at the time. Both of them needed to change a lot before she could ever through to him.

"Exactly," she says with a triumphant smile and he can't find any other word to describe her than adorable.

"It's a good thing you're doing, Sakura," he informs her while poking her brow. There's a moment when he thinks he might want to break in this new apartment, but his eyes quickly scan down to her barely visible baby bump; so when she leans forward with her eyes lidded for a kiss, he plants one on her forehead instead.

"We should get some rest," he dismisses her while going to make up the futon in the opposite corner of the room.

Her brows are furrowed and she looks nothing short of disappointed but she nods and goes to wash their teacups.

* * *

 

Every morning for the last month has followed the same boring blueprint; that is, until the around noon. Sasuke makes breakfast that Sakura will eat close to four portions of before complaining that she's getting fat and eating another. He'll walk her the couple of blocks to the clinic and she'll always kiss him for far longer than he deems publically appropriate before he leaves. In her defense though, he hasn't been kissing her other than when he leaves her in the morning. Every day her stomach seems to grow, in his mind making her and their child all the more fragile; though everyday his desire for her grows with it. He hasn't acted on any desires since she was about nine weeks pregnant, and though he went years without needing the comfort of another body, with her around all the time it's hard to control himself.

After dropping Sakura off, he'll make a loop around the village, starting in the "bad" (poor) part of town to check on how the Hidden Rain and its people are recovering. He'll mix his redemption journey in every once in a while in between uncovering the details Kakashi wants, sometimes it's just help an old lady with her groceries or fixing a leaky roof—a death sentence in a place that the sun forgot—or even stopping a mugging. If it's ever the latter he makes it a point to speak with the person who's crime he's interrupted after he's kicked their ass, and tell them a well-rehearsed and very censored version of his past in hopes that they too might find redemption. If he sees any kids that look like they might need help—he recognizes their eyes, for his own were once the same—he sends them to Sakura and the little clinic she's still working at.

By the time he reaches the richer part of town and makes finishes his rounds there, collecting information on the newly established government officials, it's lunch time. The habit of bringing Sakura lunch is making him run through cash so fast he's had to find a bank in town that services the Uchiha accounts. It started the first couple days, when he'd brought her an outrageous amount of food knowing she'd eat it all, and she ended up giving over half of it away to the kids who would crowd around her before making him go get more because she was still hungry.

Pretty soon he was forced to, like today, order enough to feed a small army from Sakura's new favorite tea house down the street from the clinic. Luckily since he's such a loyal and generous customer they always send their kitchen boy, Koji, to help him drag the three carts full of food to the clinic.

"Sasuke-kun, Koji-chan! What have you brought for us today?" Sakura greets them with a warm smile from the doorway as soon as they're in view. Sasuke is right on time as always, he may be afraid to touch her now that she's pregnant, but he refuses to make his wife wait for him ever again.

"Sakura-oba! I know you've been really into black tea lately, so I had Rida-oba make you a big Kocha Gammon," Koji tells her excitedly when they reach the door and she holds it open for them both to enter with the food.

At once Sasuke is pounced by six different kids, all of which he sent here for the mental health services, many of whom share a very similar past with himself. A chorus of "Sasuke-oji!" breaks out while Sakura takes the cart he's carrying and gives him an amused look. Being a father has given him a much different outlook on children. One day his own children might greet him this enthusiastically when he arrives, so he does his best to not push the kids away or hurt their feelings.

"Come on kids, leave him alone and come make yourselves a plate," Sakura chides from the other end of the lobby, giggling at his relieved face. "You too, Koji-chan, come eat with everyone!"

"Okay, Sakura-oba! Thank you very much!"

When all of the children are sitting to eat and mostly complaining about Sakura stating group therapy was next on the agenda before they can be done for the day, Sasuke sits across the little table from her in the office right around the corner that he converted to a break room on their third day here.

"So what needs done today?" he asks her with forced warmth, he's trying to remember that this is his beautiful wife, a girl he's loved in one way or another since he was twelve, sitting across from him and not some ravenous animal. The noises she makes while shoveling food into her mouth aren't helping though. When he asked her about her appetite, after she hit him for "calling her fat," she explained that because of her seal she always needed more calories than most people anyway, to convert into the surplus of chakra she constantly sends to her seal. Pregnancy seems to exacerbate this, as the baby already needs more chakra than a normal fetus being an Uchiha, and she refuses to let her seal dissipate, even just until after the birth. He understands that last part though, she worked hard for it and he knows she equates her value as a Shinobi and a doctor to the little diamond on her brow.

In between bites she gurgles out, "Well, the heating on the second floor is busted." She burps unapologetically. "And we had a big trauma come in today from the slums, kid's okay but there's blood everywhere but we can't clean it because we don't want the door open for the kids to see, and there's only two of us here today."

Most of the patients at the clinic tend to spend all day here, some learning about chakra from his wife, some helping him fix up the place and some just being around people. He knows the answer to his question before he asks it, but he still needs to do so. From what he can tell, the clinic back in Konaha wasn't this… unorganized you could call it, but Sakura just lets the kids do whatever they want while they're here. Wasn't she the one who was squawking about not getting attached to them back when they first got here?

"This isn't a daycare Sakura, if you're not treating them at the time, why are they still here?"

She gives him a level look and waves a gyoza at him while she speaks, "Sasuke-kun, these kids are different than the ones back home. Their issues may be the same, but there's no orphanage here, and there's no academy to speak of yet. So part of helping them means giving them a safe place to be kids. They're also gaining work experience from working with you and the one's I've been teaching chakra control to might make fine Shinobi one day."

He raises an eyebrow at her. "Are you sure that's all there is to it?"

Looking away slyly and picking up a special black tea flavored dango he knows Koji made just for her she mutters, "I don't know what you're talking about."

"Sakura, we bought them all coats last week."

"It's getting cold! And no to mention it's always raining here! It's either we buy them coats or pay for medicine when they get sick, Sasuke-kun."

"Sakura," he warns her with a teasing tone.

"Okay, okay I know! That's why I've been focusing more on the other doctors' training instead of treating them myself. And as for spending the rest of the time with them… Well it's just…" Placing a hand on her slightly swollen bell, she looks out the door towards the kids. "I see them all different now that we're having one, ya'know?"

He closes his eyes and sighs, but under his breath loud enough he knows she'll hear he mutters, "Yeah, I know."

 

* * *

**Yaya! So I already have like half-ish of the next chapter done, and tehehehe it'll be worth the wait I think, so check back tomorrow or the next day boys and girls! ;D**

**Decided cuz... Okay my brain hijacked my fingers about halfway through and wanted me to show you more of their daily life kinda thing, so they're gonna stay in the Rain until at least half way through the next chapter, so even though there's time skips and stuff like with this one, you'll more details like this one too. K? K.  
Like that I gave you more of a peak into "daily life" (why do I keep calling it that? Iunno)? Rather get me stick to the more plotty story line and just skim over stuff like this? Let me know!**

**And as always, have a wonderful day boys and girls!**


	19. Mood Swings

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I know guys! I'm late! I just couldn't get this chapter right for the life of me, but I think it's all good now! -Guy style thumbs up-
> 
> So... This chapter has more mood swings than pregnant Sakura sorry not sorry for the emotional roller coaster, it has a point I promise!
> 
> Enjoy

 

 

It's New Year's day when Sakura brings up the topic he's been expecting for a while now. He's busy in the kitchen starting breakfast when her hands snake around his waist with her now quite large belly pressed against his ass.

"Sasuke-kun, breakfast can wait, come sit with me for a minute."

Sighing, he lets himself be dragged to the low table and helps his wife sit on the cushion beside it before sitting himself.

"You want to stay," he states because it's true. They've been here for three months now, and the clinic is starting to actually resembles a proper establishment now. The help from the kids and the poorer part of the village even got the attention of the new government, and funding is in the works. And yet, no one has even mentioned Sakura leaving yet.

She nods and hums while taking a sip of her tea. "Not forever, just until the funding gets worked out. I know you don't like that we've stayed even _this_ long, but I'd really like to."

He closes his eyes and pretends to deliberate, teasing her _is_ his favorite pastime after all. When he opens them, her face has fallen just as he expected from how long he's made her wait and he has to bite back a laugh as he pokes her forehead. "Fine Tsuma, just a little longer though."

The smile on her face looks like it might cause the fine porcelain of her skin to crack. Throwing her arms around him, she chants, "Thank you! Thank you! Thank you! Thank you!"

He lets a small smile on to his own face as he relaxes into her embrace, wrapping his arm around her growing waist. The way she nuzzles her soft hair into his neck, the way she presses her growing chest against him, it's all too much. He may be a master of self-control but he's only a human man after all. Too soon for both of them, he pulls away. Any more contact would do what it always does to his body, and he can't have that. When he looks back at her face before trying to get up to resume breakfast, her brows are furrowed and her cheeks are red with anger like they always are when he withholds affection.

She swats at his hand when he goes to poke her forehead again, the first time she's ever denied him that. "I don't want a poke on the forehead, dammit!" she huffs out and affixes him with a glare. If looks could kill…

Gulping, because though her look can't kill him, her fist can, he tries to explain himself.

"Sakura…"

"No, Sasuke-kun! I already know why you won't… Why you won't… Dammit! Shanaroo!"

A little relieved she knows he's just afraid he'll hurt the baby, he sighs. "Then why do you keep trying to force me?"

Hurt would definitely be an understatement for the look in her eyes right now, as would angry for her face. "Because I'm your wife! I may be fat, but I never thought you'd let that kind of thing bother you, you bastard SHANAROO!" she yells at him with a raised fist.

"What? Don't be stupid Sakura, you're not fat," he tries with a soothing voice, but apparently today is a very bad day for her hormones, and he thought her mood swings were crazy before… And on a holiday where both of them are planning on being alone in the apartment all day, no less.

"Oh, so now I'm fat _AND_ _STUPID!?"_

"What? No, dammit Sakura stop being ann…" luckily he catches himself in time before he makes things worse.

Or so he thinks. "WHAT WAS THAT SASUKE? AM I _ANNOYING_ YOU BY WANTING TO SLEEP WITH MY HUSBAND?! IS _THAT_ WHAT YOU WERE GOING TO SAY!?"

Gods help him. "Sakura, calm down!" he finally yells back, not being able to handle much more of this this early in the morning. Even six and half months pregnant, Sakura still makes him wake up at the ass crack of dawn.

"NO SASUKE! IF I'M NOT FAT THEN WHY WON'T YOU SLEEP WITH ME? WE HAVEN'T DONE ANYTHING EVEN REMOTELY SEXUAL SINCE WE LEFT KARIN'S! WHY DON'T YOU WANT ME ANYMORE!?" she cries. There's this moment where her face changes from angry to understanding than overwhelming hurt. "Or is there just no point for sleeping with me now that you've rebuilt your clan?" she whispers through the tears, almost so quietly that he can't hear and clutches possessively to her stomach.

The tears, he definitely can't handle the tears, he's never been able to. Shit, this is bad! As every tear falls from her face, a little part of him falls apart with it. How many times does he have to make her cry over him? How many until she's suffered enough? She still thinks he doesn't want her because he loves her… Of all the stupid things for the annoying woman to say!

Scooting closer, he places a _very_ tentative finger under her chin, bidding her to look at him. "Sakura," he tries again with the soothing coo that always turns her to butter. She sniffles and looks at him finally. "We can't do that; it'll hurt the baby's head. Shouldn't a doctor know that?"

He's just about to curse himself for the last sentence, expecting more anger when she pulls her face away to let out a boisterous cackle. Now he's completely confused; her mood swings are bad, extreme even but it's rare that she goes from anger to tears to laughing in five minutes.

"You think…" she pauses to laugh some more at his raised eyebrows. "You think we _can't_ have sex because of the baby?"

He blinks. "Well yeah, it could poke its eye out or something..." When she only laughs harder, he adds a "Right?"

Now, as student of Orochimaru and a Shinobi of the Leaf, Sasuke knows quite a bit about the human body. Granted while learning to kill someone the female reproductive system doesn't come up often, but he took the same sex-ed classes when he became a genin as everyone else, so he knows all the parts and for the most part how they work. And even though other than that the only "talk" he ever received was from Kakashi when they were thirteen and Sakura started her first period on a mission. He had half-jokingly taught Sasuke and the Dobe how to put a condom on a cucumber because Sakura could get pregnant now (which ended in his sensei and best friend laughing and him spending the rest of the day attempting to attack them both). Sasuke is pretty sure he knows enough about the female body to know that shoving something up a vagina while pregnant is a good way to injure the fetus.

Wiping the now very humorous tears from her eyes, she finally calms down. "Sasuke-kun that's not how it works. People have sex while they're pregnant all the time, and pregnant women are hornier than a dog most of the time. It's completely safe and normal."

Again, he blinks. "What?"

"Mhmm, in fact if a patient came to me in the last parts of their pregnancy with complaints of discomfort or to help get the body ready to delivery I would _tell_ them to have sex, Sasuke-kun."

"Are you… are you sure that's how it works?" he asks, scanning through all of the knowledge he has of the female body in his head. He was positive that you weren't supposed to do it while pregnant; maybe he just heard that from someone?

"So that's why we haven't…? You thought it would hurt the baby?" she asks while placing her hand on his thigh.

"You honestly think I'd do this willingly?"

Chuckling again, she slides even closer, so that she's almost on his lap. "Where'd you ever get a stupid idea like that, _Anata_?"

He's just about to break the sexual tension he's ignored for nearly six months when a memory hits him like a brick wall. It was the same day Kakashi put the condom on the banana. Naruto had told him in passing, after Sasuke was done trying to kill him, that he wasn't sure why adults wanted to get each other pregnant until they were a lot older. He went on to say that you couldn't have sex with a pregnant lady so he was going to wait until he was too old for sex to have kids.

Just kill him now.

He hasn't made love to his very-sexy-and-currently-sucking-on-his-neck wife in _**six**_ months because of the _**Dobe**_. He'd rather get struck with his own Kirin than tell Sakura or any other living soul that, though.

Snapping back to the present moment, said sexy wife is taking off his night shirt that she's taken to wearing since hers won't fit now. At once, he has the arm of Susanoo summoned to scoop her up and they're over to the futon in a flash. As soon as he gingerly drops her giggling and very naked from the waist up form on the futon, he releases the jutsu and pounces her. He's still very careful for her belly as he ravishes her mouth for the first time in so long that the sloppiness reminds him of the first time.

He's rock hard in seconds when he pulls away to look, actually _look_ at her breasts. He's been blatantly ignoring her when she walks around in various stages of undress to avoid this very situation for months, and he's beyond aroused by her swollen and noticeably larger than before breasts. Greedily, he takes one in his mouth and could die for the loud mewl she makes. Not wasting any time, he reaches his hand down to her clothed sex and isn't too shocked when she's soaked through the fabric. She helps him enthusiastically with the removal of her sleep pants and panties, and takes no pause in ripping off his shirt and tearing an ungraceful hole in his shorts.

"Sakura," he groans when her hand closes around his diamond hard erection. The friction is the most delicious thing he's ever felt after so long without it.

He quickly inserts a finger into her dripping core, and begins pumping in pace with her hand, praying he has enough in him to wait until she's ready. Without hesitation he adds another, curving them _just_ right and uses his thumb to flick back and forth over her clit as fast as his muscles will allow him. Just when he feels her about to come, he finds himself roughly being thrown backwards to the tatami covered floor.

In a matter of seconds, Sakura is on him like a wild animal, crawling up his body with a predatory look in her emerald eyes.

"You take too long," she bites out as she aligns them and sinks her hips down, quite a feat as she can't see and she can't even reach what she's doing. He takes a moment while she adjusts, and he's trying to ignore the urge to ram his hips up into her for the amazing moist heat, to study every inch he can see with his Sharingan. Her breasts bounce more, her belly is swollen but the skin is still a creamy white, her hips are wider in a way he notices that he really likes and her—his mind can no longer process complex thought when she finally moves.

 _This_ is the best thing he's ever felt. Even better than the first time, since this time he's not nervous and he's not just waking up from a nightmare. He also hasn't released himself since the last time he was with Sakura, not wanting to have something he thought she couldn't (they saved _lot_ on hot water though). With how the pleasure is building in his groin, he doesn't think he's going to last long and he can only hope Sakura won't either.

Trying to focus on anything but the pleasure, he opens his eyes—that have been shut with pleasure since she started moving—to look up at the pinkette. One hand is in her hair and the other is groping one of her breasts, and her face is the picture of ecstasy.

"Sasuke-kun, Sasuke-kun!" she's chanting and he sees her hands reach down towards where they're joined but she grunts when she can't comfortably reach around her belly, her fingers stopping short by only a centimeter or so. Delighted at something to distract him, he reaches down, purposefully twisting his arm in an uncomfortable way so he can focus on that and not the rapid stroking of her body on his, and pinches her sensitive bud between his middle most fingers.

The effect is immediate. Her walls start to flutter around him, and he makes quick work of massaging her in frantic circles until his shorts are soaked and she's screaming louder than when she was angry just minutes ago. He doesn't think she's _ever_ clamped down on him tighter, as she continues to cry broken strings of his name, her entire body is spasming and her hips are slamming into is harder and harder though they slow to a crawl in their speed.

The tightness mixing with too slow thrusts and her disheveled and scrunched up face are too much for him. With all the care he can muster, he rolls them over and positions himself so he's sitting on his knees with her thighs on his. She looks up at him from lidded eyes and he pauses for a moment to make sure she's okay. An orgasm of that magnitude seems brain-melting.

"Don't stop, please don—ah! Ah!" she's interrupted by the audible _slap_ of his hips meeting her rounded ass.

She raises her legs and he collects them together with his arm, hugging them to his chest with her feet on either side of his head. Leaning forward a little bit with her legs still securely trapped on his chest and his hand on the tatami for stability, he slams in again and again, hard and fast. He has to bite down on her calf to stop from screaming with her, as she's once again a writhing mess beneath him, one hand pulling at her hair and the other palming greedily at her breast. Hastening his pace, he lets his eyes wander under scrunched eyebrows from her face to her bouncing breasts and back.

Finally, _finally_ the coil snaps and he's greeted by his own mind-melting orgasm as biting her leg becomes too painful for his lungs and he can't help but let out short, loud grunts as ecstasy washes over him from his groin to the very edges of his soul in waves, releasing itself in bursts within her. When it's over he collapses back on his knees and releases her legs, both panting and drawing ragged breath.

Through gasps, Sakura giggles and teases him, "See, I'm fine."

Pulling out of her, and helping her to sit, he smirks. "You were screaming a lot though, sure about that?"

She hits his stump playfully. "Baka, go make me breakfast! Shanaroo!"

"You could give me a minute, haven't done that in a while."

"And whose fault is that?!"

* * *

After breakfast, Sakura goes out to their small balcony to check if any hawks have come, but like every other day since about a week after they got here, she comes back empty handed.

With a fallen face and an exasperated sigh she informs him just as he expects, "There's not even anything from Ino-pig or my parents!"

Though he's been gradually more worried by this, he tries to assure her that, "I'm sure they're all just busy, Tsuma. Gods know we've been."

"I know, it's just…" she trails off with another sigh and rubs her belly thoughtfully before he helps her to sit on the floor cushion with a grunt. "If we're staying here, we really need to get a proper table. I hate being so helpless, I mean I can't even get up and down from the table or bed without help!"

Sakura's been trying to get him to let her decorate or buy more comfortable furniture since a week after they got here. Every place they go, she makes it her mission to make it a "home" and he hates it. Decorating and pretty furniture are pointless, but if it would make her life easier...

Furrowing his brows at his wife's obvious unhappiness, he quickly gets up to make some black apple tea, her new favorite since Koji brought her a box for the Rinne festival last week. "When the shops open up the day after tomorrow I'll go purchase a new table set while you're in your morning rounds," he decides once the water is on to boil.

"Thank you, Anata," Sakura replies with nothing but warmth in her tone, and a slightly smug look probably from finally getting her way in everything today. She seems much more relaxed since their breakfast tryst, but he can't blame her. He feels multitudes better; he might even go as far as to say he too is relaxed.

At least he is until Sakura let's out an "Oh… OH!" while clutching at her stomach. In a matter of seconds Sasuke is by her side, crouched down with his hand frantically rubbing circles on her back.

"What is it, is it gas? Do you need to go to the bathroom? Does it hurt? Is it the baby? Dammit Sakura! I told you we shouldn't have done that!" he rambles, nearly saying the words all at once.

Sakura just has a shocked look on her face as she says anther "Oh."

Grabbing her face a little roughly to look at him, he nearly spits out at her, "Dammit woman, what is it?"

She smiles with tears welling in her eyes though, and removes his hand from its grip on her face to sprawl it out on her swollen belly.

"What are you…?"

"Just wait, Sasuke-kun," she chides.

Suddenly, there's a little bump against his palm and his eyes widen. Sakura nods to him, and he sits down fully beside her, leaving his palm where it is.

"Say something, he kicked last time you talked," she instructs him.

"What should I say?" he whispers.

"Well, you're going to have to be louder than that, Anata!"

Leaning his head down a little so it's only about half a foot from her stomach he says as clearly as he can, "Your mother is annoying." And just as Sakura swats at his back, there's a little flurry of motion again. He looks up at Sakura and she nods and rotates her hand in the air to get him to continue. Clearing the traitorous lump out of his throat he gives a curt nod in return before lowering his head a little more.

"But I'm sure you're already well aware of that. I don't know how you stand living inside such an _annoying_ woman," he teases pointedly and shoots a glare at Sakura's giggle because it's moving her stomach. Again, there's another little movement, and it's the most incredible thing he's ever felt in his life. It feels like a finger swiping back and forth under her skin every once in a while, but he's pretty sure the tiny object is actually a foot.

His child is moving inside of his wife, and he or she is doing so to the sound of _his_ voice. His child already loves him just as much he loves them apparently, and he's never been happier in his entire life.

"He likes you already," Sakura says after placing one hand over his and combing the other lovingly through his hair.

He moves his face to hers, kissing the tear from her cheek before moving to her lips in a chaste but passionate gesture.

"Thank you, Sakura," he murmurs against her lips after a moment and joins her in a light chuckle when their child moves underneath his hand again.

* * *

Reluctantly, they decide to finally leave the Hidden Rain a month later. The funding for the clinic they rebuilt and modernized with Sana had finally come through. Also, the doctors were not only getting paid now, but they finally had a grip on what they originally set out to do. Three days before they came to this decision, Sakura had even gone as far as to say they had every bit of training that she'd received (though she taught herself) and could run the place without her very pregnant self now.

But that wasn't the only reason it was so important to leave now. They still hadn't gotten a single letter in nearly four months, and it was past the point that either of them could dismiss it as their friends being busy. Something must have happened, though they hadn't heard any news about a crisis in the Leaf or anything, something was definitely wrong here.

So they both decided that after Sakura had settled everything in the clinic, they would head for Karin's hideout. Sakura was a month into her third trimester and waddling around wasn't exactly the best option for traveling to all the way into the heart of the Land of Fire. Karin's hideout was at least a quarter of the distance. And just before they left last time, Sasuke had assisted her, with Sakura's instructions, in installing a new communications device that they could use to speak to anyone else that had one as well in real time. Though these new "phones" sounded too good to be true to Sasuke, Sakura had assured him over and over that she'd used them back in the Leaf for six months before she left with him.

If there was any problem in the Leaf he'd leave Sakura with Karin, even if he hated the idea, and go to help their village.

First though, they had to get Sakura _to_ Karin's hideout. They left yesterday morning at the asscrack of dawn as usual, with Sakura bundled up in both of their cloaks and a large maternity coat that Sana had gifted her for New Year's.

It's noon now, and they haven't even reached the Land of Grass. Sighing, Sasuke glares daggers at the mile marker telling him they still have at least 10 miles to travel before they're out of this god forsaken country. Sasuke might like the rain, he could even honestly say he likes the snow, but it does neither of those things this time of year here. Sleet, ice rain whatever you want to call it is the worst weather phenomenon in his mind, it's as cold as snow with the added benefit of soaking through to his bones through his three long sleeve shirts and his winter coat in a matter of moments.

Sakura seems to notice his wish to Ameterasu the mile markers because she sighs and mutters, "Sorry, Sasuke-kun. Is it okay if we stop for a minute? I gotta pee again."

He knows she can't control it, he knows it's his fault for knocking her up and not making them leave a month ago, but he still can't help feeling utterly annoyed when she asks him like that to pee every ten minutes. He knows she only asks because _she_ knows how grumpy he is this freezing cold, but still, he's never had a grown person ask him to use the bathroom. Especially not twenty times a day.

"Ah, I'll unpack the bentos," he replies with a sigh, scowling at the mile marker one last time before turning to his wife. "Need any help?" he asks because he knows she'll no doubt need his help standing back up when she's done. Again.

And again, like every time today and yesterday, she replies, "No, I got it Sasuke-kun!" with a huge grin that could melt his heart if the rain hasn't already frozen it, before waddling off about twenty feet away from the covering they choose for lunch.

Sitting against the nearest tree, he sighs contentedly as he pops his neck and stretches. The bentos don't need to heated up, but maybe it would be a good idea to start a fire before they both catch colds. Sakura already can't hold her pee, he'd hate to see what would happen if she started sneezing uncontrollably.

Standing back up and stretching further, he's just about to go in search of dry wood for a fire when his world stops dead.

To the left, there's a woman's screams. No, they're Sakura's screams. In an instant, he has his Rinnegan eye closed to charge, his Sharingan in his other activated and his Kusinagi drawn before he flash steps towards the sound of his name being screeched. He stops a few feet short and circles around the clearing his wife is in with all the silence of the trained killer he is. He sees two figures standing with his wife, one with their arm wrapped around her throat and the other, the one speaking, standing in front of her.

"Relax sweetie, you're not our priority. That husband of yours is, though we'll get paid extra for you, so you might wanna try to win us over," the man croons to her.

"Go to hell!" she spits back, sending her elbow flying backward in a chakra charged strike, nailing the man holding her right in the ribs, but he disappears in a cloud of smoke. A clone then, but still that's his girl.

The moment she's free Sasuke opens his Rinnegan and locks her in his vision, using the correct pulse of chakra to teleport to where she was standing, leaving her safely in the bushes. The purple aura of Susanoo surrounds him, manifesting the full skeleton with a powerful roar.

"Who sent you?" he spits at the man, noticing his head band is that of Leaf Shinobi, but its crossed out and he doesn't recognize him.

Instead of answering, the man just chuckles dryly, cracking his knuckles. "Oh, they told us about your abilities, so we made sure to come prepared with a strategy."

Sasuke is just about to ask what strategy that would be before attacking when it hits him, if that was just a clone earlier, then why does he keep saying "us?" He bites out a curse and Sakura's name under his breath when she's brought out by another man, whose chakra he can't sense and can barely see with his Sharingan. This one is a Grass ninja, also rogue. He can barely breathe when he sees a chakra charged fist at her stomach and kunai at her throat. Any counter attack she attempts will guarantee either her or the baby will die. The Grass-nin left himself open to attack, but he knows he's safe. What father could choose between killing his wife or his baby?

His eyes flicker back to the Leaf-nin, and he's positive he can take him no problem, but what will the Grass-nin do then? Any way out of this fucks him, Sakura or the baby. He's trapped with only one possible option to save his family, an option he knows they're hoping for but won't expect, hopefully it'll lower their guard enough to create an opening. And even if it doesn't he only needs them both to leave with him so he can take care of them when Sakura and the baby aren't in danger.

"I'll go peacefully," he ascents with a scowl, letting his Susanoo disappear.

"Sasuke-kun! No! No! Let go of me, SHANAROO!" But he can't look at her. He knows he's stronger than both of these ninja combined, but he also knows that _anything_ can happen. Their could be an entire army waiting for him, a more powerful shinobi, anything. He's not so arrogant as to think he can't die anymore and if this is the last time he's going to see her, it can't be with her crying and begging him not go once again.

"Awe, what a family man! Really pulls at your heart strings, doesn't it Naota-san?" the Leaf-nin coos, taking a tentative step toward Sasuke.

Naota just grunts in response. Sasuke lowers his sword but doesn't drop it, desperately racking his brain to find _any_ possible way out of this. If he can get them to leave Sakura, both of them to leave with him, he can kill them. But if Naota stays with her until they're sure that they're both safe, all is lost. He's almost in arm's length of rogue Leaf-nin when Sakura speaks up again.

"Sasuke-kun, look at me please! Anata! Please just look at me!" she begs, obviously exhausted from fighting off the choke hold she's been in.

One last time then, he'll look at her one last time just in case. Keeping his Sharingan activated to ingrain her in his memory one last time, he turns his head a fraction and could sing for joy for what he sees, though he betrays nothing. Over her stomach in, layers upon layers, there's a swirling mint green chakra, so thick in fact he can only tell that the baby is still alive by the way her darker green chakra pulses towards her stomach with her blood. It'll hurt, but she'll be able to protect the baby from the impact her belly is about to receive.

"Thank you, Sakura," he says before teleporting himself so that they've traded places again. The man holding her noticed the swirling of his eye, and seconds before the swap took place plummeted his hand towards her belly. Calling upon the black flames, he lets them have their fill of the man whose arms are trying to wrap around him like they were his wife. To free himself before the flames touch him as well, he send a charge of lightening chakra to his blade and surges himself forward, ridding the man of both forearms in one graceful motion.

It all happened so fast, Naota is screaming and on his way to Hell's door before the Leaf ninja can even register what's happening. Sasuke raises his blade again, about to charge when Sakura lunges forward with a pained expression. One hand is desperately clutching at her belly through her torn cloak, while the other is drawn back. He predicts the moves with his Sharingan, and he knows she'll make contact.

Lowering his sword just seconds before the impact, he allows time to slow, and watches ever detail. Her pink hair, at least four inches past her shoulders now, is animated in the wind of her lunge. One fist glows blue with concentrated destructive power while the other glows green to heal herself and their baby—a feat he's not even sure Tsunade could pull off while 30 weeks pregnant. Her face, though pained is pulled back in an angry scowl he's seen many times, but never so filled with absolute rage and hatred. Finally, he checks her chakra, and their child's and is the most relieved he's ever been that they're both at least going to live through this. She's absolutely breath taking in this moment; a pure killing machine mixed equally with a caring mother, healing her unborn child.

With a crashing wave powerful enough that it flattens the trees in a twenty foot radius, she makes contact with the left side of his chest, just over the heart. He slams into the ground, nearly dead, in the center of her signature crater.

"WHO SENT YOU, SHANAROO!" she bellows as Sasuke leaps down beside her, a smug look on his face. If it had been anyone else in her position, they'd be dead now, and Sasuke is once again reminded how amazingly powerful his wife can be when she wants to.

"Oh come on…" the man coughs up some blood with a sick cackle. "You should know, shouldn't you? You're the one who banished—"

He's cut off by Sakura's shriek, and just before another one of her punches reaches him, he pulls out a little firework and pulls the string. All three of them watch the red smoke billow into the air in a towering line while Sakura sends a lethal amount of chakra to her fingertips. Before Sasuke can stop her, she's slashes a chakra scalpel through the Rogue Leaf ninja's throat, spraying blood upwards all over her tan cloak and her face, dying her pink hair a sickly red color.

She stays there, straddling the man she just killed while clutching her stomach for some minutes while Sasuke tries to logically think of what the man meant, and forget that he just saw a girl he's known since he was six kill someone for what he assumes is the first time.

Because of him.

Movement catches his eye as Sakura uses her free hand to wipe the blood from her face. Mechanically, she goes about searching the Leaf-nin's body, still clutching her stomach with a glowing hand.

"Sakura," he tries but he's not sure she can hear him.

It's not until she finds a bag full of scrolls and paper with some numbers scrawled on it that she speaks. "It's not your fault, Sasuke-kun. It's mine," she whispers with more conviction than he expects. Before she stands up—gracefully and without his help this time—she closes the man's eyes in a practiced manner he's sure she's done hundreds of times in the field.

Sasuke blinks when he's handed the paper with the numbers on it, sheathing his sword he realizes that they're coordinates.

"Find where that is on the map," Sakura orders in tone he's heard countless times, but never towards him. It's the tone she uses during a medical emergency, when she knows she has to be in charge for the patient to live.

He doesn't comply right away, as she finally moves her glowing hand from her stomach and opens the bag of scrolls she found under the rouge's vest. Something seems to register in her when she sees the scrolls because her eyes widen and her breath hitches.

"It's all the letters we've been missing," she tells him, pulling a scroll he recognizes as Kakashi's out of the bag and holding it up to him. "There's one from my parent's, Ino, Naruto… They're all in here."

"Who would have…?" he starts but his question is cut short when Sakura finally looks at him, a look close to guilt in her eyes.

"Homura and Koharu," she whispers, a look of disgust on her face. "Shisou's last act as Hokage was banishing them quietly for their part in the massacre."

Sasuke blinks, and looks back to the coordinates in his hand. He figured her and Tsunade did something like that, but he always pushed it as far back in his mind as possible. He'd wanted to kill them once, but he pushed it out of his mind when he worked towards redemption. Even now he works diligently to not think of them, the two left living who were responsible for all the pain in his young life.

But presented with Sakura's bloodied and very pregnant form, he can't think of anything but his anger now, as he turns to sit under a tree and pulls a map out as calmly as he can. Sakura stares at the scrolls for a few more moments before tying up the bag and placing it in her satchel to come sit next to him. It seems she purposefully sits far enough away that he face still gets hit by the freezing rain, the droplets mixing with the blood and what might be tears to stream down her face in the lightest shade of red that can't be called pink.

Sasuke looks away from her, and goes about calculating their current distance from the coordinates on his map. When he's almost done, she says the worst possible thing she could.

"I'm going with you, you know."

With furrowed brows he turns to scowl at the pinkette, nearly growling, "Are you stupid!? They tried to kill you!"

"They tried to kill you too," she retorts.

"That's different, I'm not pregnant, stop being annoying. You'll stay here and wait for me," he orders in a biting tone.

"I will do no such thing!" she bellows, on her feet so fast he's now completely sure she faked being helpless this whole time just to make him feel useful, and possibly to manipulate him into buying furniture. "I should have killed them, Sasuke! We couldn't take them to trial right after the war, it would have caused too much of a commotion but I shouldn't have let them _retire_ so peacefully! If I would have just fought Shishou a little harder they wouldn't have come after my family!"

He marks the map with the rendezvous point before turning a glare at the pinkette and saying as calmly as his voice will let him, "They were after me."

"And why do you think that is? Hm? Because _I_ got them banished, because _I_ married the guy who wanted to kill him, because _I'm_ carrying the future of the Uchiha clan! Now what? You gonna tie me up? I'll break the chains! You gonna put me under a genjutsu _again so_ I don't get in your way? We both know that's dangerous for the baby! There is _nothing_ you can to stop me from coming with you, SHANAROO!" she spits at him.

"DO YOU HAVE TO BE SO ANNOYING ALL THE DAMN TIME!?" he spits back, knowing he's lost. There really is nothing he can do that won't put their child in more danger to stop her.

"Yes, I do," she says with a smirk when he doesn't try to tell her no again.

"You better not slow me down," he shoots back, and when she gives a shy look—her mood swings are incredible—he rolls his eyes and summons the Susanoo. The purple aura surrounds them both, manifesting fully and roaring as it flaps its wings.

"This is a bit much don't you think?" Sakura chides him when they leap into the air.

"They already know we're coming."

* * *

They reach the rendezvous in a matter of minutes thanks to rapid flight of his Susanoo; it's a library-type structure with a little shed behind it only a few miles outside of Rain. Sakura curses when they see smoke billowing from both structures. They're too late.

Once they land, Sakura makes a quick water jutsu, using the rain to help and puts out the flames on the bigger building. They share a silent look before both making their way inside, both extremely cautious in case the fleeing Elders thought to leave any traps.

Sakura makes her way to the desk in the corner of the cavernous room and gasps after a few minutes of rummaging. Sasuke drops the documents he was reading through, not at all surprised that they're all classified and from the Leaf before their banishment, and hurries over to her.

His eyes widen at what he sees, and he vaguely registers Sakura's hand on his.

"Sasuke-kun… That's us…" she whispers.

And indeed it is, black and white surveillance photos of the two of them spanning months based on the varying levels of Sakura's pregnancy in them are sprawled all over the desk, having fallen from Sakura's disturbed hands. They'd been watching them the entire time they were in the Rain, waiting for the moment to strike.

Wait, watching them?

Could that mean that they were the ones who were watching them back when Sasuke encountered that lady in the woods? That would mean they're the ones that sent him that note, does that mean they were trying to help him uncover the hidden threat to the world? But then, why would they try to kill him? Unless they were just trying to bring him here to speak with him? Their attackers hadn't stated what they were supposed to actually _do_ to him when they had him, Sakura and he had killed them before they could say. But then why would the Elders have fled before they could get here?

Sasuke's mind is flurry as he breaks away from Sakura to scan through every document that has yet to burn for anything about the Ōtsutsuki. He scans file after file with his Sharingan, looking for _anything_ that would explain their actions, both the note and the attack.

Anbu reports, no.

Special jonin list, no.

Village rebuild plans circa nearly three years ago, no.

Meeting notes about the Sixth Hokage, no.

War notes with the Fifth, no.

Possible Jinchūriki selection candidates, save this for Naruto's sake, but still no!

"Sasuke-kun! It's going to collapse!" hears Sakura call just as a beam falls right for his head. Summoning the Susanoo, he quickly forms the ribs around himself and reached the hand out to grab Sakura, his eyes finally bleeding from the strain. While his eyes pulse with a subtle pain he knows all too well, he quickly runs them out of the collapsing building.

"Sasuke-kun…" Sakura whispers in a strained voice, wiping the bloody tears from his face once they're outside. He notices that her other hand is clutching to the surveillance photos tightly on her swollen belly but doesn't comment. He knows she's as worried by this revelation as he is. But they need to get out of here now. Sakura can't handle another fight, and there's no telling anymore hired assassins will come after them at the Elder's bidding. There's no time to dig through the rubble and continue searching for answers.

As he turns to leave without a word, Sakura calls out to him. "Wait! We have to destroy it! There's sensitive information about the village inside! It's our duty."

Sighing, he utters a "Fine," before summoning the black flames of Amaterasu with the building in his sights, bending it to his will to devour the building.

They watch from a few feet apart as it quickly burns to ground with the roaring power of his jutsu. When it's nothing but rubble and a few flames, Sasuke finally turns again.

"Let's go."

"R-right."

* * *

 

**Woooooot! Finally done! And may I just say I suck at fight scenes, but oh well xD**

**I haven't started typing the next chapter but I have it planned out in my head.**

 

**And as always have a great day!**


	20. Rain

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I'm baaaaack.
> 
> So this was super hard to right. I hope you guys like it though :D I was pleased with how it turned out, even if it took me an absurd amount of time to complete!
> 
> Enjoy!

 

" _You really hate the rain don't you?"_

_It's a simple question really, seeing as how Sasuke was hunched under a tree in a tiny ball looking rather like a cat than a shinobi. He did hate the rain, but she couldn't know that, and she definitely couldn't know the reason, so he thought._

_So he gave her an indiscriminant grunt as she sat beside him._

_It was shortly after the chunin exams with a new Hokage in office, on a lazy D rank mission transporting a scroll with only the genin members of Team 7. The Dobe was snoring loudly under a tree a few yards away, also shielding himself from the rain. They had gotten nearly exactly half way when a veritable monsoon hit, drenching them all to the core. It was a warm rain, the kind that even in its annoying assault, kissed your cheeks and combed through your hair in a pleasant way._

_Just like that day._

_But the pinkette beside him would never know why he hated the rain, or why he hated most things. It's not really that he kept it a secret; on the first day that they became a team he revealed his goals. It's just that the loud, annoying girl would never understand true pain like that, enough to cause a true and deep hatred for things._

_He pondered, as she settled next to him under his shelter with a book, that she might one day be traumatized too. As a shinobi she might have to kill, she might have to see death; she might even have to fight in a war. But she'll never know loss like he has, and he knows the girl will never hate things like he does, especially not people._

_Perhaps, he went on to ponder as she absentmindedly brushed a strand of hair behind her ear, she's not cut out for this life. Sure she's grown, especially since the Forest of Death—though he can't bear to picture her like that for some reason—but she's too kind, too gentle for this life of killers. None of them have killed yet, but he knows they'll all have to, him especially, and he can't picture her doing anything but falling apart afterwards._

_But he's different, he's always known this. It became especially apparent ever since the last time he saw that certain person. He can't see either of his teammates, the snoring blond who just rolled over, or the pretty girl with a textbook—no, his female teammate with the textbook that's beside him, ever hating anyone._

_And yet his biggest problem in life is not harboring enough hate._

_So he turns it into a game at times, hating things. He'll think of something he doesn't care for and brood over it for hours; training his heart to hold even more hatred than it already does before he lets the thing go._

_Then he'll think of that certain person, whose name alone can throw him into a rage, and he'll fill his heart with even more hatred._

_But the rain, well he always liked the rain even when he was a kid, so this kind of hate might be different, he realized as Sakura closed her book and peaked over at him._

_The rain reminds him of the lifeblood of his clan being washed away before he got the chance to say goodbye to it._

_It reminds him that he was so weak that all he could do was stare up at the raining sky the day after his world was destroyed and pretend that the tears were just water droplets that fell on his face._

" _You hate a lot of things," Sakura speaks up again, interrupting his brooding as she always does. He expected her to be asking because she thought he hated her, expected her to be superficial as always, but when he looked at her face from under his bangs, all he saw was understanding._

Many times after he left the village, he wondered if at this particular moment in time, she already knew about his brother and his clan. He always wonders, even now, if she was trying to help him, even she was just talking about the rain.

_He grunted back at her and she smiled as she always does when she interprets his noises in lieu of speech._

" _I think I hate the rain too, when it's like this," she went on, resting her head back against the trunk and staring out at the sheets of falling water while inhaling deeply. "But there are things I love about it too."_

_He grunted again and peeled his eyes off of her content face to look out at the water too._

" _That's how it works I think."_

" _Hm?" he was so caught up in his thoughts he didn't realize he'd awarded her with something close to a word until it was too late._

" _You can't ever truly hate something without loving it a little, without the love there it's just dislike, ya'know? Like, it's not as strong without first loving the thing you hate."_

_He was just about to fly into a fit of rage like he had started doing when she held her hand up and sighed without looking at him._

" _But it's the same for love. When you love some…_ thing _you can't just dislike the things about it. You_ hate _those things about what you love. That's just what I think anyway."_

_She laughed him off before he could think to respond and got up to go wake Naruto as the rain started to weaken its assault. A little less than a week later he said goodbye and thanked her for everything._

But even until the day he married her, he always thought about the first time she actually said that she loved him.

And he knew that in her own way, she was telling him that she hated a part of him too.

Maybe the girl _could_ hate.

* * *

"Gahhh! Holy shit! What happened to you guys?" Karin screams at them when she meets them in the dark several meters from the hideout entrance as always.

"We were attacked, obviously," Sasuke replies in an impatient tone. He's been carrying Sakura with the Susanoo for the last two hours; she was so tired she could barely stand when she finally passed out.

"Sakura-chan?"

"Exhausted, can you take her? Hey careful!" Karin quickly grabs the pinkette from his Susanoo, he knows she's _being_ careful but the way Sakura jostles around like a ragdoll isn't helping his already fried nerves.

As they reach the rocky entrance, and quickly make their way down the winding labyrinth of hallways towards the lab and living areas, Karin finally speaks up again.

"She's covered in blood Sasuke-kun..," Karin whispers, finally able to see her better in more than the moonlight.

"Ah, it's not hers. I need to use that phone thing as soon as we get to the lab, is it operational?" he asks in an urgent tone he knows she's rarely ever heard from him. Panic might even be seeping into his voice a little.

They reach the lab, and Karin wastes no time in pointing out the phone for him while she hurries to the bathroom with his wife. He watches the pinkette's arm bounce with Karin's every step and gulps as he walks to the phone. Beside it is some list of codes and luckily he doesn't have to look long to see the one for the Hokage's office. Sakura had made damn sure that they had this connection to Konoha, and it might just keep them safe now.

He picks up the plastic device and holds it to his ear like Sakura had taught him to and hears a buzzing noise every couple of seconds, hopefully that means that it's working. And hopefully their former sensei is still in his office at this time of night, it's only around nine o'clock, but he's always been a lazy bastard.

"Hokage's office," a lazy drawl answers on the other end, and Sasuke could jump for joy if he any other man but himself.

"Kakashi-sensei," he says with more relief than he meant to use, not even realizing he'd called the man sensei again after all these years. There's a strange comfort in the father figure he never wanted, though he'd never admit that.

"S-Sasuke? What is it? What's wrong?" By the tone of his voice, Sasuke knows that the white-haired man is on his feet already, prepared to calculate a defense or deploy an attack at a moment's notice. Kakashi was always good like that; so annoyingly lazy and bored until it counted, then he was a pure killing machine.

"Sakura and I were just attacked, we're okay but…" he pauses and thinks of how much he can really tell his former sensei. Yes, he can trust the man, but as for the others in Konoha… Well the Elders surely have friends in some powerful places. And after everything that happened in the war, prematurely telling Kakashi everything about the Ōtsutsuki might be detrimental as well.

When Kakashi coughs—like a nod, neither of them ever enjoyed using too many words—to let him know to continue, Sasuke decides, "What I'm about to tell you needs to stay between us and the people you trust, the other half you need to tell _no one_ , understood?"

He can almost feel the stoic Hokage straighten up at his orders, Team Seven surpassed him in the war, and they both know it. It's strange that even with Kakashi's constant threats he's the one who seems to trust him the most now, even more than his own wife.

"Right, just tell me what's going on."

There's a strangled gasp from the other room, but he has to ignore it. Karin can do more than he can if there's something wrong with Sakura.

"Part one: Homura and Koharu, the former elders…"

"Yes, I know them," Kakashi affirms.

"They sent two assassins after us today, and it wouldn't have been that much of a hassle but…" he pauses again. He's about to lay all of his weaknesses on the line, and even in front of someone like Kakashi it's a bit much to admit that he allowed his pregnant wife to be captured and injured. Sighing, he continues, "Part two: Sakura is around 30 weeks pregnant."

There's a choked out gasp followed by a series of coughs on the other end, but no comment yet.

"They had her in a choke hold with a fist on her stomach, luckily she was able to put a barrier around her stomach for both of them to survive, and Karin is with them now."

"Sasuke…"

"Let me finish, Kakashi," he orders, feeling raw by telling everything, but it's the only way. "So we both took out one of the would-be assassins, rogues from the Leaf and Grass, but the one Sakura had was able to set off a flare while he was giving us information. We found some letters from you and everyone back in Konoha, and more when we reached the rendezvous the Elders were at. They had fled and set the building on fire, we put it out. Inside, we found sensitive information regarding the Leaf." His voice is becoming more and more like the business tone he uses for mission reports by the second, trying to cut himself off from his failures, his wounded pride and his wounded wife. "On one of the desks, Sakura found the rest of the scrolls we hadn't received for the last four months along with surveillance photos spanning our entire time in Rain." When he finishes, he's out of breath, he's not sure he's ever talked that fast before. He feels rather like a child relieved to finally tell his parent about a bully at school, and it's not a feeling he's ever truly had, or one that he really likes.

Kakashi seems to think it over before speaking. "What was their end goal, true assassination or kidnapping? And of which one of you?" He pauses, and when Sasuke doesn't answer right away adds, "I'm aware that Sakura and Tsunade banished them on your behalf, so speak truthfully, Sasuke."

"Not sure which one of us, made it sound like they wanted me, but not only did they get to her first, most of the pictures were of my wife and not me."

There's another coughs on the other end, but he ignores it.

"And they didn't make it clear to their intentions before we killed them."

"Sasuke…"

"Yeah," he replies dejectedly. They—no _he_ fucked up royally on this one. He hadn't even attempted to put out his Ametarasu on the first one fifty percent because he could get information from the second and fifty percent because the vile thing had put his hands on what was Sasuke's. But he hadn't expected Sakura to feel the same way, to have the same blind rage over someone going after _him_. He knows their love for each other is similar, but he's never seen true hate-filled actions from her before. He saw that first flash of hatred that night at the bench, but never before had he seen such a pure being as his wife, who opens _children's hospitals_ for Christ's sake, ever display that amount of hatred and rage. She looked almost like him, like a true Uchiha (though when he has the thought he nearly groans).

"I'm guessing you let all of the remaining files burn away?"

"Ah."

"And Sakura-chan, is she okay? The baby?"

"They're with Karin," he reiterates because he doesn't know how else to answer that question.

"Okay, here's what we're going to do. Listen closely because I don't know if we'll be able to talk like this again, no telling who that's in and out of my office is one of their spies, got it?"

"Ah."

"Stay with Karin until Sakura has the baby, if they're really after her or your child, as little people need to know that she's pregnant as possible, I won't tell anyone for now. In exactly one month I want you to call me again, and ask me if I have the new Kunai for you. If I say not yet, it means don't come back yet, if I say yes that means it's safe to come back to village, and if I say no it means I've found evidence that the Elders are planning something and you are to take Sakura and your child and get as far away from here until I send for you, do you understand?"

He knows the answer to his question before he even asks it. "Is that last one even necessary?"

"Sasuke, they may be even older now and they may not have Danzou, but don't forget who else pushed for and covered up the massacre. Those two were in power nearly since the village's inception, it doesn't sound _too_ crazy that they'd want that power back. It could be that they planned on taking you two out, the blemish on their records, and coming back to village to be on my council or worse if they're pissed. And it sounds like they're pissed. If I find that they have more connections than I deem safe for an Uchiha infant, you are to stay away. Okay?"

"Understood," Sasuke whispers. Sakura isn't going to like this, but she'll do it anyway to keep their family safe. He still can't nip the feeling that it's his entire fault though.

He hears Sakura and Karin coming back into the lab.

"Right. Don't call until then and don't reply to those letters. You two are officially in the wind."

"Ah, Kakashi-sensei," he affirms, purposefully leaving the sensei in there for the old man, before hanging up the phone.

When he turns to the women, Sakura is now clean and in a big robe with a tired smile on her face. Karin, who's helping her stand properly has a worried look on her face a bruise starting to form on her jaw, slightly covered by her now wet hair. Well, at least Sakura is well enough to employ that temper of hers.

"She needs to rest; can you take it from here?" Karin asks him in a strained voice. Looking rather guilty for some reason he can't identify.

Walking up to the women, he only nods. Sakura wordlessly moves her arm from Karin's shoulder to his, and he accepts the bag of letters from the red head before heading towards the bedroom area.

Following them to open the doors, Karin asks in a quiet tone, "So I'm guessing you two will be staying here until the baby comes?"

He refuses to look away from his wife's sunken face; she's never looked this bad before. Her seal is even missing a few spots of lavender. "Ah, the Hokage has declared us as missing. We're in the wind, so hopefully we'll be okay here for a while."

As she shuts the bedroom door behind herself, while he's helping Sakura onto the bed he barely hears what sounds like, "Yeah, hopefully they'll be okay."

Once Sakura is on the bed securely, he goes about stripping himself of his cloak, vest and shirt before sitting next to her with a long sigh.

"Hand me the bag, would you Sasuke-kun?" Sakura croaks out.

"You need to sleep, Tsuma," he tries with as gentle a tone as he can muster, but the annoyingly stubborn woman is already sitting up.

With a sigh, he reaches out for the bag and hands it to her. He only takes the scrolls out from Kakashi, letting her marvel in the knowledge that her friends and family are all safe and still love her. Barely skimming over the mission details and inquiries into why he hadn't been responding to the specific requests (it seems that Kakashi had gotten all of the information he'd sent, but of course nothing was streamlined to the letters he hadn't received), they sit in a comfortable silence for several minutes.

"Sasuke-kun! Guess what!" Sakura gasps every few minutes. So far, he knows his in-laws opened a new expansion to their bakery, and Lee and TenTen were seen on a date a couple of months ago.

"Hn?"

"Temari-san and Shikamaru-kun had a son, and Gaara-sama got married though it doesn't say to whom," she replies before reading the next letter.

After a few moments, she pipes up again, this time even more excited. "Sasuke-kun, guess what!" She doesn't even give him time to reply before going off into a scramble of giddy. "Ino-pig and Sai! They had a baby! On New Year's eve! They named him Ino-jin! Isn't that great?!" She continues reading when he taps her seal and nods, and not before long is at it again. "Oh, oh! Apparently that woman Karui I'm guessing 'cause Pig just called her 'the Bitch' is pregnant too, due in the summer, so Ino-Shika-Cho will go on into the next generation, isn't that great!?" she boasts at him.

"Ah," he replies because though it may be great for them all, it doesn't matter much to him.

When he settles down in bed next to her, she asks with the same tired smile, "I wonder who our kid will be teamed up with?" before going on to the next letter he recognizes as Naruto's.

He doesn't reply because he hasn't told her yet that their child might not grow up in their village, if Kakashi's answer is no in a month. He doesn't even want to think of it himself. Somehow everything went from perfect to shit in the course of this stupid ass day, but what else should he expect?

Sakura gasps again and this time outright laughs as she flings the letter down. He raises his eyebrow when she starts to calm down from her laughing fit. "Hinata-chan had the baby, a boy, and you'll never guess what Naruto-baka named him!"

"Hn?"

"Boruto! His name is Boruto-chan!" she's thrown into another fit of giggles that rattles her swollen belly in a way that reminds him that they too are enter this point in their lives, just like their friends.

"Dobe was never one for subtlety," he conceded with a dry chuckle.

"Hey, Sasuke-kun?" she asks while she hands him all the letters to put on the night stand.

"Hn?"

"What do you want to name this baby? We haven't really talked about it."

Settling back on his side, he stares at her stomach with intensity as he thinks. "I haven't really thought of it," he admits as she finally slides down to lay beside him.

"Well, for a boy, what do you think? Itachi-kun maybe?"

She seems to notice his flinch at his brother's name, so she taps her finger to her chin. "Fugaku? Shisui?"

"I don't want any name from an Uchiha. I don't want our child to grow up in the shadow of the infinite number of dead relatives they already have," he whispers, because even though he just now realized it, it's true. He grew up in their shadow, Itachi's especially and he would never wish that on their child. When her face falls into a look of guilt and sadness, he backtracks. "But it's not going to be a boy, anyway."

"Oh? How do you know?" she whispers, his declaration working to calm her.

"Well when Mother told Aniki that she was pregnant, he just seemed to know in the moment that I was a boy," he admits to the precious memory that his brother gave him, still astonished he can call him "Aniki" in front of another person.

"Then for a girl, what do you think?"

He thought of it for a moment before rolling to his back to allow her to bury her damp head into his bare chest. "Something like Chishiki, maybe?"

Sakura laughs heartily to this. "And you said _Naruto_ isn't subtle?"

Frowning, he teases back, "Well I don't know. I've never had to name anyone before Sa-ku-ra."

"Knowledge, huh? What made you pick that?" she wonders while he combs his fingers through her pink hair.

He knows exactly why, but he's not going to tell her, so he stays stoically silent. This child is the embodiment of the fact that he's loved, that he has a family again. He knows whenever he looks at his daughter (or son) that he'll _know_ he's not alone anymore. This child will be the knowledge he's been searching for his entire life, even before the massacre. Finally, there's something in the world that's entirely his own, and Sasuke will admit he's always been a selfish man.

"Hm, well if it's a girl then…" Sakura trailed off to tap her finger to her chin like she always did, and it brought with it waves of warmth throughout him with every meeting of her finger to her chin. Did this woman realize how beautiful she was, even when she looked this bad?

Outwardly though, he murmurs, "Then what?"

Rolling over, she chuckles slightly as he snakes his arm over her stomach protectively now that she's on her back. "Don't laugh okay?"

"You're the one laughing," he says with a smirk.

"Yeah yeah, okay! So I was thinking _Sa_ kura, _Sa_ suke and I _ta_ chi, right? And knowledge…"

"Hm?"

"Well I was thinking Saraswati, but that might be too complicated."

"The goddess of knowledge?" he ponders, it does sound a little weird to name your daughter.

"But I thought about maybe giving Itachi-niisan a tribute too, not just us. So… Sara _da_. What do you think?"

He ponders this intently while he reaches up to turn out the light. When he's settled back in a sleeping position, he finally decides, "I think I like it."

"Yay! But Sasuke-kun! What if it's really a boy?"

"Hn, Karasu or something," he teases while settling into the warmth of his wife chuckling form.

* * *

Two weeks fly by as Sakura stays in bed most of the time sleeping, and he and Karin set up for the incoming delivery. He doesn't like the look of most of the equipment or the procedures he has to learn, but both women time and time again assure him that a cesarean may be necessary and it's best to be prepared.

But still… the thought of his wife being cut open is enough to nearly put him in a panic attack. And dealing with only two women isn't helping since Juugo hasn't shown up the whole time they've been here doing some kind of business for Orochimaru or something.

It hasn't been all bad though, truly hiding in this hideout again. Two days ago was Sakura's birthday and she made him and Karin get so drunk that he still has a hangover, the stupid woman. He hadn't had the chance to get her anything yet, but at least he mentioned it this time. It was a start.

"Oh, Sasuke-kun! Is the nursery all done?"

"Tch, if you could call it that," he responds to his wife as he walks into their designated bedroom. Karin and he have spent the last five days baby proofing the room that's usually Juugo's for a baby, even building a crib. Though he doubts Sakura will let the baby out of her sight once she's born, so he's still not sure why she insisted.

Speaking of his wife, she looks like the shit stuck to the bottom of your shoe after a rainstorm these days. Her seal is so faded now that you wouldn't even know it's there if you weren't looking. Also, she sleeps about eighteen hours out of the day, but every time he asks her about it she waves him off and says it's normal. Karin is even less of a help, she only cringes and changes the subject much to his annoyance.

Taking of his shirt to wipe the sweat from his brow and his neck, he sees Sakura waving for him from her place on the bed.

" _Anata,_ " she breathes when he sits next to her and lets her pull herself up on his shoulders.

" _Tsuma_ ," he breathes back as he allows her to hold his head to her chest, bending uncomfortably at his waist to keep her from stretching.

"Not long now," she chuckles tiredly.

"Ah."

"Sasuke-kun, are you happy that you're going to be a father?" she whispers in a way that makes him straighten to study her face. There are the beginnings of tears at her sunken green eyes.

"Of course," he whispers back before sighing. "I'm a little scared too, but this is what I've always wanted," he admits because it's true and he's hiding enough from her already.

She chuckles again, a tear slipping down her cheek as she brings a shaky hand to his face. "The last checkmark on your list from back then, hm?"

He flinches as if he's been hit. "No, that one was marked off almost a year ago," he tells her with a little scorn to his voice because she should know that by now.

"Hm," she hums as she falls back to the bed. "Bed time I think."

"You just woke up," he chides, but lets her rest head on his spread out leg.

"The baby's taking a lot of chakra, it's an Uchiha after all. I'm tired," she explains with a yawn, rolling over to let him lay next to her.

* * *

He doesn't know when he falls asleep, but when he wakes, the clock says 3:05 and his thighs are wet.

Feeling down his and Sakura's intertwined legs, he feels that the wetness is coming from her. With an audible "Oh!" he realizes it must be her water breaking.

"Karin! Karin!" he calls as he springs to his feet and feels around for the light. Karin's already opening the door, a dish towel in her hands when the fluorescents flicker on. Their gasps are in sync and immediate when their eyes adjust.

There in the bed, the sheets covering Sakura are stained vermillion from her swollen belly down, and she's ghostly pale. Without another moment's passing, they both spring into action, Karin grabbing Sakura while he runs to the lab to set it up like they practiced _just in case_.

But he never thought this would actually happen.

Before he so much as has the surgical equipment out, Karin's already beside him, with Sakura on the stainless steel table.

"This wasn't supposed to happen, Karin. It was only practice!" he says in a panic, looking over at Sakura. From the medical texts he'd been reading to prepare, since there was no way two people in hiding could safely go to a hospital for a birth, he knows how important it is to act quickly or they might lose both Sakura and the child.

But it was all just in case, Sakura was supposed to break his hand while cursing him and screaming her Shanaroos. She wasn't supposed to really be bleeding to death on the table, lifeless and pale.

"Well, I might as well tell you since it's happening," Karin mutters. "But first, go hook her and the baby up to the monitors, remember how I showed you?"

He nods and flash steps to his wife, not looking at her face, her seal all but invisible now. "What do you mean tell me now?!" he bellows as the monitor kicks on with the calming sound of her beating heart.

As he straps the baby monitor around her stomach, and Karin finishes laying out the scalpels and such, she bites back, "Sakura-chan, you know how she is! She told me not to tell you."

"What KARIN!?" he screams at her again, trying to remind himself in his head if he kills the only medic here, then all is lost.

When they meet again at the sink to scrub their hands, she responds in muted tone, only looking at his hand that she's scrubbing for him. "When you got here, there was a tear between the placenta and her uterus, Sakura's been keeping it patched up with chakra because the baby was underweight when I examined her. It still is, but now that we've given it an extra two weeks it's not in any danger anymore."

He takes a calming breath and mechanically goes about gathering information as his hand is scrubbed raw. "Why is the baby underweight? It's only a couple of weeks early."

"We think there's a reason Uchihas always married within the clan, the child needs more chakra than a normal fetus. It's why all of their chakra was so massive," she responds as she moves his hand to the scalding water.

"And now the placenta is completely detached? She's hemorrhaging?"

"Yes," she replies as she goes about scrubbing her hands too.

"And you both knew this would happen when she ran out of chakra?"

"It was a possibility, yes."

"So why the fuck did you let her wait!? Why didn't you tell me!?" he screams again, trying to keep from gripping the sink to steady himself. His hand needs to be sterile.

"Because she knew you'd make her deliver immediately, and she didn't want to risk the baby. She forced me to comply." After a beat she adds, "Go prep her, oh right, here." After putting the glove on his hand for him, she goes back to scrubbing.

He walks over to his wife, completely numb and cuts the robe she was wear before laying the surgical mats around her stomach and covering it with iodine.

"You do know that if she dies, I'm going to kill you, right?" he bites out when Karin moves over to the other side of his wife.

"I expect nothing less, I couldn't convince her after all," she replies mechanically while she grabs a scalpel.

"Then why did you let us stay here? You could have made this not your problem before she got to this point."

Karin makes the first cut while Sasuke sucks away the blood with the tubing. "Because of what she told me the first time you both came here."

They focus for a moment, while Karin swiftly makes her way through Sakura's abdomen to her uterus, both holding their breaths when a bleeder shows up.

"What did she say?" Sasuke asks when she tells him to go grab some blood.

"Most of it is between us girls, but basically…" she pauses to look him in the eye for the first time once the IV is started and the blood is hung. "She would be doing the same thing for me if this was me and this child was our child. There's a certain comradery among women, Sasuke-kun. I know she would have done the same for me," she affirms again as she goes back to cutting and pulling for several more minutes. He simply does what she tells him, suction here, cauterize here, clamp here; he can't process much more than that.

"Hn," he grunts as she finally reaches her destination.

"Are you ready to become a father? Just one more cut," she whispers with a smirk, pushing up her glasses with her elbow.

"Ah," he nods as he grabs some towels to drape over the Susanoo arm he's summoned.

There's a rush of blood before Karin's hands disappear. "Grab the scissors," she commands.

When her hands plunge upwards, there's a tiny raven haired child in them. "Cut three inches in from ummm," she turns the child to look at what he's already seen, what he can't take his eyes off at the moment. " _Her_ stomach," she instructs.

With a few snips at the rubbery chord, he officially becomes a father, and he can't breathe as he places the child on the Susanoo's hand to clean. It only hits him when Karin hand him a blue sucker without looking up that she's not crying. He tries to focus, not let anything hit him yet because there's still work to do, but when he suctions out her nose and she takes a little gasp of hair before crying softly with wide eyes pointed at him, the entire world stops and he can't even hear Sakura's heart monitor anymore.

As he wipes her little face, noticing with pride that her eyes may be as black as her hair, he can't help but trace every line of her tiny face. She's all Sakura, down to the forehead his _daughter_ will one day probably grow to hate just as much as her mother does.

It's only when Karin growls out a curse that he realizes he can't hear Sakura's heart monitor because _it's not beeping._

"Go put the baby down over there and grab the paddles, _NOW!"_ Karin commands, and his body moves faster than his brain can comprehend.

"Charge 200, it's the same one Orochimaru always had so—" She's cut off when he hands her the paddles, turning the appropriate dials just how he remembered having to do with Kabuto when a test subject was in surgery and Orochimaru forced him to help.

"Karin," he warns as the blaring noise of the monitor start to make him a bit dizzy.

"I know I know, clear!" she bellows as the paddles hit the center and the left side of Sakura's chest, causing her to jolt upwards. "300, now! Come on Pinky!"

He turns the dial again, and as Karin yells "Clear," again he screams back, all in a panic. "Can't she just bite you!?"

"Doesn't work like that, she has to be at least a little conscious! Come on Pinky, come on!"

He finally looks at Sakura's face, and leans down to her ear as Karin yells another "Clear!"

"If you die on us, I will _hate_ you for the rest of my life, you annoying woman!" he whispers with scorn in his voice, just as the heart monitor begins beeping again.

They both sigh as he straightens back up and share a _look_.

"We need to finish quickly, her heart can't take much more," Karin says mechanically, handing him the paddles.

Her hands glow green as she pumps what he assumes to be an extreme amount of chakra in Sakura's abdomen. He nods as he starts to pull her closed while Karin stitches her back together with chakra. Every once in a while she stops to move to her thigh, willing her femur to create more red blood cells on its own.

After a few minutes of this, Karin finally sighs. "I've got it from here, go check on the kid."

He only nods and whispers "Sarada," as he walks back to the table with his dozing newborn on it.

He hears Karin groan slightly from the exertion when he reaches his daughter, but Sakura is alive so now he can properly meet the raven haired beauty who's opening her eyes to greet him. He's once again mesmerized by the near perfect replication of his wife on the girl's tiny pink face as he reaches into the sink to fill a basin with warm water. As he meticulously wipes the girl clean, an idea hits him. She always kicked when she was in Sakura and she heard his voice, maybe she'll smile or something at him if he speaks.

"Hello, Sarada," he tries, but his voice comes out more like a croak than anything else. He realizes he's been fighting tears for a while, and now that the shock has faded, he doesn't know if they're from seeing his wife die in front of him or from becoming a father. Maybe a little of both, but it hardly matters. If there was ever a moment he could allow himself to cry again, it would be now.

"I'm Sasuke, and I'm your father," he tries again, wrapping the girl up in a pink blanket he'd had Karin buy last week. When he goes to touch her feather soft ebony hair, she grabs his finger and all is lost. The tiny pressure of it feels like a boulder, radiating from his chest to the finger that she holds. He finally understands what those books meant, about him not feeling like a father until he met her. Before she was just an idea, a nearly heavenly being that he only got glimpses of when she moved inside of her mother under his fingertips.

Now though, she's staring at his crying face in newborn wonder, the only face she's ever seen and holding his finger with a strong grip that gives away who her mother is without a doubt. She's barely bigger than his hand, but he can already tell how strong she is and it's no thanks to him. She's probably the first Uchiha born from such a love, a truly untainted being all his own, and though the thought is terrifying, he has a full smile on his face as tears start to soak the pink wool.

'Itachi, can you see this? Everything you wanted for me has finally come true," he thinks to himself as Karin appears beside him.

She reaches out and strokes the little face of his daughter and breathing heavily she whispers, "She's finally here, eh?"

"Sarada," he whispers back as the girl falls asleep still clutching to his finger.

"I'll check her out, you go take Sakura-chan to bed and clean her up, 'kay?" she instructs, nudging his hand away.

"Will she be okay?" he asks in earnest, not looking away from his daughter's face. She really does look like Sakura.

"As far as I can tell, yes. It's all up to her now though," she tells him with a smiling face, picking up the little pink bundle.

As he carries Sakura away with the Susanoo, he hears Karin coo to the new Uchiha, "Hi, Sarada-chan! I'm your Oba-chan, Karin!" And he can't help but smile to himself.

Somehow his life is working out, even if nothing goes as planned. And as he washes Sakura with a warm cloth and settles her into the bed, he can't be anything but grateful that this day happened, even if it was the most terrifying day of his life.

"Thank you, Sakura," he whispers as he kisses her brow, where her seal is slowly starting to darken again.

* * *

Once his daughter is sleeping peacefully with Sakura, and Karin crashes on the sofa she was sitting on in the lab, he decides to go get some fresh air. He's tired to his bones and he can barely breathe for the smell of blood on his clothes mixed with antiseptic, but this night is over, and it's a new day.

It hardly ever rains here, most of the rain gets swept away to the Hidden Village that it's named for, but when he steps out of the hideout he's greeted with a monsoon. It's cold and it's biting in the pale grey morning, but it's not at all uninvited. There's a lot to think about later, he doesn't even know where they'll live or where their daughter will grow up, but there's time to figure that out together as _parents._ There's a threat from the Elders and possibly from the Ōtsutsuki, but for now they're all safe.

For now, it's March 31st and he's a father and his wife will live even though she nearly died only hours ago.

And he always did love the rain.

* * *

**Ooookay! So! Sarada is born, everyone else is having babies, everything seems to be going good!**

**Hope you all enjoyed it! I was nervous about the birth scene, so let me know what you guys think, kay?**

**And as aaaaaalways, have great day boys and girls!**


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